New Platy -- Pregnant?

[gwenmoran]

Hi, everyone: We are the lucky winners of one full-grown platy and one tiny baby platy from my child's class "fish lottery." They came home about two weeks ago and we've set up the tank (10 gal.), heater, and added a few more, with the counsel of our local tropical fish specialty store. I suspect, due to a bulging belly and recent lethargy, that the full-grown platy is sick or pregnant. Is there any way to tell for sure? The fish store doesn't open until later today, but I was hoping to get some insight here. The other fish (the tiny platy, which is growing quickly; two small snails; a tiny catfish; a couple of pink danios, and a very small pleco).

I'm a total newbie, so I don't have the tools to test the tank water yet. All of these fish (except the big platy) are tiny now, but we're planning to get a bigger tank for them, as I know we're pushing the population threshold a bit.

And if the platy does turn out to be pregnant, do I need to separate her? Or do something else for her?

We had some goldfish a while back, but they were pretty easy to care for, all things considered. Something tells me that's not going to be the case this time around...

Looking forward to learning more about how to best care for these little guys.

Thanks.

 

[HCpetraitis]

You would probably get more replies if you put this in the livebearers section. Also, It sounds like you're doing really good for just starting. Maybe if you could take a picture of her and post it with your question in the livebearers section. If not, watch her closely and if she has a dark spot between her tail and her fins (this is called a gravid spot) then she is pregnant. If she's pregnant then you have a big decision to make, you could either keep a VERY close oeye on her and when she starts having babies you could put her in a breeder box and the babies would be safe, or you could let her have the babies in the tank and then if you see them you could put them in a breeder box. Livebearers will eat their babies if they see them in the tank. They don 't know that they are babies and they think that it's a nice snack. I hope all that helped! Good luck!