Swordtail Babies

[baby_6882]

hi. i have 1 male and 2 female green swordtails. Both of my female are having more babies than i know what to do with. I put them in a community tank with everyone else and when the female starts having babies it is into the breeder. Anyway my question is how long does it usually take the baby to turn male or female. The biggest babies and a few months old and no signs of the male tail. I know my fish couldn't of had 37 female babies could she?

 

[OldMan47]

You are correct Baby_6882, she did not have 37 female fry. Swordtails are notorious for being slow at developing their sexual characteristics. Often, the gonopodium will start to develop before the tail and even that can come quite late. I got 6 wild type green swords last July that were about 1 1/2 inches long at the time. It was late December before any of them gave even a hint of being males. By that time they were a full 3 inches long plus their female-looking tails. The first sign that I had was a thickening of the front edge of the anal fin before it develop[ed into a gonopodium. I had seen that before so I watched him and a couple of weeks later he had a proper gonopodium and a very short spike on his tail. Today he has a very nice fully developed tail but my guess is that he is almost a year old.