Anyone know?

Got these little guys about 2 1/2 weeks ago. There's 3 total right now, a male and female black molly, and 1 unidentified balloon molly. I plan on getting 1 or 2 more females asap.
Has anyone else kept Mollies and have any advice?
Sorry the pics are blurry, my camera is ancient.

Thats one female ballon mollie. You can tell the diference like the others. Males have a gonopodium looks like this:





So at the moment you have 1 normal male, 1 normal female and the 1 female ballon mollie.

Just a warning they re-populate very fast! I had one mollie have over 200 fish.... and at least 150 survived....

Thanks for the reply leafgirl. I am concerned now about the females getting pregnant and what to do then. I would have researched before I got them, but they were a surprise gift from my bf.
May I ask for some more advice if you don't mind? First off, I have these three now in a 10 gallon tank - is this too small you think?

That's fine for now, but once they start to breed....

Your going to become way overstocked. You can let nature take its corce and let most fry fend for them self (be eaten) the ones that survive will be stronger. From then you can sell them if you want. Do you have any local lisings on the interent?

Well sure enough, I woke up this morning and there were 2 fry hiding in some java moss!! I ran to the store and got one of those net breeders that hangs on the side of the tank. I put the java moss in with them too, b/c it looked like they were feeding on it this morning. I've tried to feed them flake food but no success. I hope they will survive and I can give them to a friend.

edit: they just ate some of the flakes!


Any suggestions will be greatly appreciated. I've never done this before!

You need to crush up the food into a powder. They will eat it then.

Ohhh, okay! I have another random question now lol. I'm wondering if it was the orange balloon molly or the normal female molly that was/is pregnant. The babies are black. Would they be black either way?

They could have been both. I think ballon mollies can be black. Any idea how long that ballon mollie was in there with your male?

If it was less than a month i would say the fry are from your black female.

Yes it has been less than a month. I got them on April 20th. Haven't found any more fry but the 2 are still doing fine and getting bigger every day :wub:

Good luck with them!

Are they eating the flake food now?

thank you!!
yes they are , i took your advice about crushing the flakes up and they immediately began eating :D thanks for the help!

NO problem ^_^

leafgirl do you have any pics of your mollies?:) :) what are yours like? my bf and i have been watching ours very closely the past few weeks, they have interesting behaviors....like at first, the female balloon molly was bossing the other 2 around, but now the male has taken charge....but he doesn't bother the black female, just sometimes the balloon molly during feeding time

This is an old pic:

Sweet! :wub: that other fish you have in there is awesome too!!

Thats my pelico who need to fined a new home (hes to big for the 20g)

oh so that's a pelico... i was wondering what it was! theres a pic of one on my bag of algae tabs.

the balloon molly just gave birth to about 20 fry. i took a couple of (bad quality) pics, but you can see the 2 older fry that are still in the breeders net. do you think its ok to put those 2 in with the big ones now?

They look so cute!

Put them in when they are lare enough that the other fish can not eat them/ biger than there mouth and will not be sucked up the intake of your filter. Make sure they have a lot of hiding places as well.

Ok, then i dont think they are quite big enough yet.
Thanks for all the helpful response, I really appreciate them!

Don't wory we all have to learn some time.

Hey do you think I could transport a some of the fry to my little brother who lives an hour 1/2 away? If so, how would you recommend doing that? Would they have enough oxygen to travel that far in my 2 gal container? He's already bought a breeders net for his aquarium and wants me to bring him some next time I visit.

How big are they? I would say the will be fine but they should be a sertain size before doing this.

I would not feed the fish for a day before the trip there so they do not excreate in the water when traveling. 2g should be ok for a few fish. how many were you hoping to give him?

I ended up giving him 8, and i took the breeders net out of the tank because it was taking up so much room and getting dirty. So far they have done fine with the big guys, and more fry have appeared but I'm just letting nature take its course now.
Even now the 2 oldest black ones are only about an inch long. I don't know how long it takes for them to reach full size or if they ever will. But maybe its best that they are staying small since my space is limited and i don't have the money for a new tank anytime soon.