Pregnant Platy Questions

[lazermoose]

I noticed a few days ago that my sunburst platy was pregnant. I've never dealt with this before but I did a lot of online research and made sure of it. I bought a breeder box and tried to figure out the best time to put her in, and I read a lot of the forums on here about it as well, but it's all so subjective, it's hard to tell when you've never done it before. I put her in for about 24 hours with the light off and nothing happened, she just got really freaked out so I took her out figuring that she wasn't ready and I didn't want to stress her out. This morning I looked at her again and she looked even more squared off and the white spot near her anal fin was more prominent, but this time I was worried about putting her in the box too early so I wanted to wait until I got back from class. 6 hours later I came back and her gravid spot looks a lot lighter and she looks less square(but not by too much) than she did this morning. Two days ago I could see the fry's eyes inside her and now I don't see much, it looks clearer. There's no sign of fry, and I have a fish in the tank that is always quick to grab food. Did she have the fry and they were eaten?
 
This is an image of her this morning, it's a little blurry but you should be able to see how square she was

 
This is an image of her now.

 
I'd love any advice you can give me! I was really hoping for fry, but hopefully if it doesn't work out this time, she will have more.
Thanks!

 

[KittyKat]

I found that the best thing for pregnant livebearers is a planted tank and to be left to it.

 

[fluttermoth]

Absolutely agree, KittyKat

 

[lazermoose]

I found that the best thing for pregnant livebearers is a planted tank and to be left to it.

 
I would probably agree and would like to do that, but I have limited funds and time and was not expecting to have bought an already fertilized fish.

 

[fluttermoth]

Bunched pond plants work very well as fry hiding places and aren't expensive.
 
You can even make bunches of 'fake plants' out of well rinsed knitting yarn or fabric cut into strips and tied together

 

[KittyKat]

Fluttermoth has a solution for everything!
 
Yes, yarn or fabric work well, especially nylon stuff as it doesn't rot Just to clarify, I did mean in the current tank, not a dedicated tank.

 

[fluttermoth]

I've had to keep my fish on a very tight budget most of my life, KittyKat