Pregnant Molly

[andymiller6891]

i went and brought an orange molly and a silver molly three days ago, all has been fine until this morning.

i woke up to find my silver molly dead and 6 baby orange mollies.

1st question is, without pics can you tell me if it was the orange or silver that was the mother and any idea why the silver would have died???

water levels are fine, nitrates were alittle high yesterday but i did a water change and added some fresh stress zyme.

there are a couple of neons in the tank to but they seen to be leaving the babies alone as i have no way of seperating them as this was unplanned.

next problem is, i only currently have a 15l tank as it was meant to be a starting out set while i got a bigger tank and started conditioning the water, how quick will the babies grow and how soon do i need to get a bigger tank??


thanks.

 

[fee de mer]

Were both your mollies female? In all liklihood the silver was probably the mother, it is common for females to die during their drop. However if the nitrates were a little high and you brought them back down the stress could have killed her and the other could be the mother. Does the remaining molly (or did the silver one) look big in the belly, have a gravid spot or have a sqaured off looking belly?

Also molly babies are bigger than most fry so are probably pretty safe from neons, keep any eye out for more fry and carry on checking that the neons arn't having a nibble! Not all the fry will survive, you will need to get a larger tank soon, don't forget to cycle your new tank when you do buy one!

Finally don't forget to feed the fry 2-3 times a day, you must crush the food into powder or else they won't be able to eat it.

How many neons do you have they should be kept in groups of six plus.

 

[fee de mer]

Also if the orange molly is the mother, and you have only seen six fry, chances are either there are more fry you havn't seen or she will drop again