Surface plants suddenly babies.

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Well whatever it is its working. I now have two very preggy female guppys. Tank is in danger being overrun here.
 
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Hi all.
I have a 180l tank that is stocked mostly with livebearers like guppys, mollys and platys along with a bnp, some Cory's and some cardinals.
I have had this tank years but have never had any luck breeding the live bearers I have only had 1 fry get to adulthood in all that time.

A couple of months ago I got a delivery of new plants along with this delivery came about 5 tiny flouting plants, i put them in, hey free plants I thought.

A few months later the surface plants have multiplied like mad. I have to skim some off every week. The wierd thing is I now have a population explosion of baby fish, its amazing.
The only difference to my tank is the floating plants.

Would this realy make such an impact?



Thoughts?
It sounds like you have duckweed which is so annoying BUT the reason your fish are reproducing now, is because they feel the tank is now safe enough with HIDING SPOTS to give birth. As long as you have those plants, you’re giving the babies places to hide and grow. This will also prevent the older ones from attacking because ether don’t like getting tangled with plants.

So I’m guessing if babies are what you wanted, then CONGRATULATIONS Hahhaha
 
It sounds like you have duckweed which is so annoying BUT the reason your fish are reproducing now, is because they feel the tank is now safe enough with HIDING SPOTS to give birth. As long as you have those plants, you’re giving the babies places to hide and grow. This will also prevent the older ones from attacking because ether don’t like getting tangled with plants.

So I’m guessing if babies are what you wanted, then CONGRATULATIONS Hahhaha
The only difference is the duckweed as I have always had a reasonably heavily planted tank.
 
I concur with everyone else, duckwheat is a horrible addition to your aquarium. There are a couple other floaters that you can get that are much more easy to manage and to get rid of when you don't want them anymore. When I had my fish room in the last house I had one duckwheat in one tank that quickly overran the tank and then that duckweed was spread to all of my other tanks and at that point I had over 28 tanks in the basement that were infested with duckweed. If you left one piece of duckwheat in a tank it would quickly become overrun again. I have something called giant duckweed which is a lot more manageable and will also absorb nitrates and if I had fry would provide a home for fry. Frog bit is another floater that is good and fairly easy to take care of, some of the fussier ones are redwood floaters or Sylvania. If you don't have any omnivores in your tank you can add water lettuce, they have smaller varieties that are also pretty prolific and really easy to get rid of if you don't want them any longer.
 
I concur with everyone else, duckwheat is a horrible addition to your aquarium. There are a couple other floaters that you can get that are much more easy to manage and to get rid of when you don't want them anymore. When I had my fish room in the last house I had one duckwheat in one tank that quickly overran the tank and then that duckweed was spread to all of my other tanks and at that point I had over 28 tanks in the basement that were infested with duckweed. If you left one piece of duckwheat in a tank it would quickly become overrun again. I have something called giant duckweed which is a lot more manageable and will also absorb nitrates and if I had fry would provide a home for fry. Frog bit is another floater that is good and fairly easy to take care of, some of the fussier ones are redwood floaters or Sylvania. If you don't have any omnivores in your tank you can add water lettuce, they have smaller varieties that are also pretty prolific and really easy to get rid of if you don't want them any longer.
Duckweed is a functional floater but also I dislike them. No duckweed in my tanks. It's so hard to get rid of them once it's in your tank.
 
Update. I have talked to my local LFS and he is willing to take some babies off my hands. I just need to get them to him. Will pop in on way home from work to get a fish bag.

I am keeping the duckweed in check by scooping quite a bit out on each water change.
 
Dang. I really wish this post existed before I started fishkeeping.

Duckweed is nightmare material. I really really hate it. I got it for the same purpose you did: to help fry survive. I saw it in the fish store and was like: oh! Cute floating plants weee!

I have regrets.

Clogs filters like no bodies business. Makes it impossible to easily catch fish without needed to cup clumps of it out of the net each time. Blocks the light from the rest of the plants.

*shudders*

I’ll have to look into the alternate floating plants that were mentioned a couple posts up
 
Dang. I really wish this post existed before I started fishkeeping.

Duckweed is nightmare material. I really really hate it. I got it for the same purpose you did: to help fry survive. I saw it in the fish store and was like: oh! Cute floating plants weee!

I have regrets.

Clogs filters like no bodies business. Makes it impossible to easily catch fish without needed to cup clumps of it out of the net each time. Blocks the light from the rest of the plants.

*shudders*

I’ll have to look into the alternate floating plants that were mentioned a couple posts up
And if you have multiple tanks, there's a chance it could get into your other tanks.
 
And if you have multiple tanks, there's a chance it could get into your other tanks.
Already there 😭

It’s made a home in 3 other tanks
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A daily problem
 
Dang. I really wish this post existed before I started fishkeeping.

Duckweed is nightmare material. I really really hate it. I got it for the same purpose you did: to help fry survive. I saw it in the fish store and was like: oh! Cute floating plants weee!

I have regrets.

Clogs filters like no bodies business. Makes it impossible to easily catch fish without needed to cup clumps of it out of the net each time. Blocks the light from the rest of the plants.

*shudders*

I’ll have to look into the alternate floating plants that were mentioned a couple posts up
Actualy I didn't plan on getting duckweed. It hitched a lift on some mail order plants
 
OK. I did a water change today and took the opportunity to catch some fry to take to my lfs. I lost count how many were in the bag but it was a lot.

Got back home and had another look. It seems I have a lot more fry in there than i realised 😆 this may take a while.
 

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