Over-amorous Male Molly Help

[mark_foster1980]

I have a male molly which has been causing a lot of stress in my communal tank as of late. It currently resides with one gourami, three danios and seven cories. Up until a month ago there were two female mollies also in the tank. Due to the male molly's overly amourous nature it caused severe stress to the two female mollies who have unfortunately now passed away, most likely from the stress incurred upon them by the male molly's escapades.

Unfortunately the male molly's libido has not died away with the passing of the females. It has been making numerous attempts at trying to impregnate the other fish in the tank, especially the much larger gourami. Imaginably this is causing a lot of stress within the tank and when my gourami turned white whilst avoiding the molly's advances I decided to separate the molly and place him in a small birthing tank for livebearers within the communal tank to isolate him from the rest of the fish. This molly is now very frustrated but the rest of the tank has calmed down quite a bit.

I'm really not sure what to do with this fish. I don't have a spare tank to put this one fish into nor could I afford to set it up for just one fish. I don't think adding more females to the tank is a good idea either given the stress he placed on the two female mollies originally in the communal tank. I'm also conscious that if I try to pass on the molly to another person to place in their aquarium I'm not really solving the problem, just passing the buck so they will go through the grief I am.

Does anyone have any thoughts on how to calm this molly's libido? Or any other solutions? I look forward to your response.

 

[hughessomefish]

hi humm,some times you get some annoying mollies just like humans they all have there own personality,if you can return him to the fish store and get another peaceful one in return,Or see if a friend would want him and like trade,other then that i dont know how to train a fish to behave,He could calm down on his own,but i really dont no.i am not an exspert when it comes to training a fish,Idk if you really can,um any other imput from another person would be nice so we can help out this person whould be nice

 

[dgerow3]

Could you add more plants or rocks to provide more hiding places for the other fish maybe I am kind of having the same sort of problem with my male molly he's trying to get with one of my female guppies and bullying the male guppies and my neons but i have rocks and plants where they can go hide for peace.

 

[OldMan47]

A mature male molly in a small tank can be a real PITA. For that matter forget the male part, even a mature adult female molly can be a bit much sometimes. I love my mollies but they need a lot of room or they will drive you crazy with their aggressiveness. They are almost as bad as swordtails that way. With lots of swimming space, both mollies and swords make great community fish but not in a small tank.