Molly Fish Babies – How to Breed Molly Fish? Details Inside!

Molly Fish belongs to a species of viviparous fish. It is found in the natural environment in the water bodies of Mexico, Colombia, and Florida. These fish are distinguished by silver and motley color.

Individuals that are bred artificially most often have a black or yellow shade of scales. If you have a black molly in the aquarium, The reproduction will not cause problems for either an experienced specialist or a novice aquarist.

Molly Fish Care

This fish is quite unpretentious in care. But for her to feel excellent, you need to follow a few simple rules:

1. Molly Fish is an omnivorous fish. Therefore, her diet should be varied. It is impossible to feed her only live or vegetable food. Overfeeding these beautiful fish is also not worth it. If you offer her a lot of food, she will eat it with pleasure, but this can badly affect her health. Therefore, feeding is carried out only once a day.
2. In the aquarium, water should be changed once a week. The pet is very sensitive to temperature and water hardness. For a comfortable fish stay, It is required to maintain a temperature of 27 degrees. Be sure to install a filter and aeration system in the aquarium.
3. The tank for keeping the fish should be spacious. For one individual, an aquarium with a capacity of at least 20 liters is required. Mollies grow to a rather large size, so you should immediately buy a bigger house for it.
4. To create optimal comfort for the pet, add salt to the water: 1 teaspoon per 20 liters of water.
5. The more decorations and decor in the aquarium, the more comfortable the fish will feel.

Preparing Molly for Breeding

Breeding mollies at home does not cause trouble to the aquarist if he follows simple rules. First, you need to prepare a separate aquarium, in which there will be a lot of vegetation and the water temperature is maintained at the level necessary for the fish.

Molly Fish Sex Determination

To distinguish between male and female mollies is quite simple in some respects. Females are larger than males, and their anal fin is made in the shape of a triangle. The fish becomes sexually mature and ready for mating after 5 months of birth.

A distinctive feature of males is the anal fin – it has the shape of a tube. He will be ready for mating after 8 months of birth.

Molly fish can also change their sex. This function is incorporated in all viviparous fish to preserve the population in case of emergency and the threat of extinction.

Aquarium Requirements

It is important to maintain the water temperature not lower and not higher than 28 degrees. Otherwise, the fry will be born prematurely, and it will be quite difficult to save them.

Spawning of molly can occur in the general aquarium, but it is important to observe the temperature regime and ensure a sufficient amount of free space.

After the aquarium is prepared, you need to pick up the male and female who have completed puberty. They will start pairing only if they like each other, otherwise, you will have to pick up different partners for them.

Fertilization may not occur for the first time, so you will have to leave them for a couple of days in the same aquarium.

With a successful combination of circumstances, fertilization can also occur in the first time, and offspring will appear in a month.

Molly Fish Pregnancy

When a female’s abdomen is rounded, we can safely say that she is waiting for offspring. The pregnancy process lasts up to 10 weeks. At the same time, the female can give birth from 30 to 200 fry, but the latter option applies only to large individuals.

The male must be removed from the aquarium as they might eat offsprings. This will not affect the birth of babies. The female can maintain fertilized cells for a rather long time. Childbirth occurs once every two or three months and continues throughout the year. Male Molly fish involvement in this process is not required.

Knowing how often mollies give birth, you can control the number of fry. If the aquarium conditions are fully consistent with ideal conditions, the offspring will be strong and healthy. To obtain offspring from one species, one should strictly monitor that both parents belong to the same species.

Molly Fish Baby Care

Mollies reproduce in the aquarium without any difficulty. The fry is born almost transparent and completely merges with water. They do not require special care, but it is still worth monitoring their activities. Fry feeds on their own and does not need parental care.

After delivery, the female should be placed in a separate aquarium. Usually, they do not eat their offsprings, but there are cases when the fry was completely eaten by moms. For FRY, you should prepare a separate aquarium of 40 liters, so that they can swim freely.

The temperature should be constantly maintained at 26 degrees. Fry reacts very sharply to water change and may die.

Water should be filtered daily and saturated with oxygen. It must be changed at least once a week. 

For feeding, you can use the same feed as for adult mollies. Food should be given often and little by little because fry grows very quickly.

Possible Molly Fish Baby Diseases

Fry is susceptible to disease, like all other living things. It is important to detect the disease in time and try to eliminate it.

Small fish often face the following ailments:

• The worries of the fish and the darkening of its gills may indicate that there is too much oxygen in the water, and the pet begins a gas embolism. To cope with the disease, you need to change the water to a suitable composition for mollies.
• If the aquarium conditions are not good, then some kind of tumor may begin to develop in pets. It is impossible to help in this case, and the fish will die.
• When the fish has lost interest in food, begins to swim at the surface, loses activity, this may indicate that the water is too cold, and mollies have caught a cold. In this case, you need to monitor the temperature in the aquarium as closely as possible and not let it fall.

Types of Molly Fish

There are many varieties of molly fish in the market and most people see black mollies in the market. There are more than 20+ varieties of molly fish and below I’m listing some popular types of molly fish.

Types of mollies:

• Black Molly – is characterized by a completely black color, without splashes. The body of the fish is oblong, slightly flattened laterally. The eyes are large, the mouth is slightly raised.
• Sailfin Molly – A distinctive feature is an unusual fin, a shape resembling a sail. In size reaches 10 cm.
• White Molly – is distinguished by a white body color with bluish tints. This refers to a variety of sailing mollies.
• Dalmation Molly – has an interesting spotty color. In size can be from 5 to 10 cm.
• Common Molly – has an elongated long body, can have absolutely any shade of scales.
• Balloon Molly Fish – a distinctive feature is a rounded belly and size. The larger the aquarium, the more the fish can grow.
• Dwarf Molly– differs in the small size, no more than 4 cm.

Each of these individuals has different shades, but aquarium conditions of keeping are very similar. Molly fishes have earned the love of aquarists for its unpretentiousness and ease of reproduction.

Mollies are a quiet and calm fish that get along well in an aquarium with the same individuals. In no case should they be kept with predators, they will become a snack.

These fish are not very demanding and live up to 5 years. With comfortable conditions and proper nutrition, they can live up to 8 years.