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Sylver's Fish Updates

82K views 575 replies 13 participants last post by  Sylverclaws 
#1 · (Edited)
I currently have a beautiful female Creamsicle Lyretail Molly, who, until the other day, had never been interested in the boys. lol She is almost full grown, I think they get to be four inches long, she is just over three and a half inches long. To my knowledge, this will be her first brood! She took a liking to my male Black Sailfin Molly, and have been...dancing for the last few days. Now, she is about three quarters of an inch larger than the male fish, and she runs my tank. Haha, so if she gets tired of him, he'll know it. I have ten females and two males in the tank, and I haven't noticed any bullying from the boys, they seem to be rather gentle for males who usually practically attack the females while breeding...Bah. The two males are also interested in three other females at the moment, so she isn't getting too bothered, and to my knowledge only lets my black sailfin near her.

Well, in anycase, I was wondering what the estimate on the brood size is for Creamsicle Lyretail Mollies. I can't find anything on it when I googled. lol They usually add in all the molly species, and I know they can all interbreed and are basically the same species, just different sizes and colors. I also know that bigger fish can have more babies, but it is her first time, again, to my knowledge. She was pretty small when I got her. I've had her for several months now, and she's grown from about two inches to her near four inch size. She really is rather pretty, as is her male "buddy."

Also, for those curious, I have a breeding net which I will NOT be putting her in to have her babies. It has nine fry from a gold dust and silver molly in it right now. I was also afraid it'd be too small and stressful for her in that thing. I have improvised a roomey area for her. I made a large net that I have tied to a very large, two gallon picher(pitcher? I hate that word lol), that I will be putting into the tank, it's used only for my fish water changes and holding for big tank stuff the fish shouldn't be present for or if I have an issue that requires them moved, so it has nothing yucky in it they can't be near, like soap. I need a separate tank for this, really. LOL But I haven't gotten one yet, I intend to get one later this year.

Anywho, yes, makeshift net tied in there, and weighed down. The whole thing can go into the tank, only temporarily, no more than a few hours I am hoping, or the other fish might get upset with me. But this way I don't have to worry about her being in there out of the tank and risk a problem, like oxygen or tempurature, or a spill. I intend to have some plants in the bottom and some gravel for the babies. When they're born, they should fit through the net and be able to get to the plants and hide until mom is done giving birth. I've also made sure it's roomey and that the net wont move or collapse, and it wont catch on her and/or cause damage. This way I can try to minimize loss of babies to being eaten, and lessen stress to the mother and other fish, it wont really be a move, she will just get sorta scooped into it and stay in the tank. I did let a different, very expectant mother go in it last night, I thought she was in labor and I had been up almost two days, I had to sleep or be sick! She did not give birth and I removed her after I had a five hour nap, she seemed not to care. If anything, she wanted back in and tried to do so. ^^; Afterwards, I will remove the fry to the breeding net and let mom have an hour or so to rest before going back to the tank, I don't want the other fish picking at her while she is tired and smells of afterbirth. Would YOU want someone poking at your rump when you just shot out a bunch of babies? lol


SO, anyone have an estimate for me on the possible brood size, or should I ask later once she gets her size on? :3 Also, what do you guys think they will look like? Creamsicle Lyretail Molly with a Black Sailfin Molly. He's pure black except the top edge of his sail. It's bright yellow across the whole top edge! Mom is a very nice orange color with a lighter colored belly and dark eyes. The male has very odd eyes, the top half of his eyes are kinda dark brown/black, but the bottom half seems to be a bright shiny gold color, maybe copper would be a better wasy to explain it. Odd eyes. lol One of my gold dust females has a black eye and a silver eye though, I guess I am used to funny-colored eyes.
 
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#102 ·
Well, here's my babies. =) Let loose in the nursery tank. For now it's my nursery. lol Had to think of something big, I have so many in there. That net just wasn't going to cut it, wasn't already. I had them split in two different nets, still wasn't even close to enough.
They're kinda hard to see sometimes, especially the ones going around by the substrate, but you can make out quite a few of them. :3

 
#103 ·
Well, I did it now. I could NOT resist. And it was of my own doing...didn't get it dumped on me or anything this time....

I saw two male black orchid bettas at the shop today when I went to get some nerite snails. One was black and blue, the other black and purple. I got the black and purple one. lol He's got ten gallons to himself. I divided the nursery tank. ^^; When you see a dish like that for the first time and have the means to care for it, it's hard to pass up. Expensive fish though, $22. And I had to buy a divider. He likes my tank though. He's not as bad off as many betta I have seen at shops. This particular shop gives them cups about three times the size you usually see...but a cup is still a cup. =( Anywho, he's gorgeous. And he'll be a happy fish with me. He needs a little touching up on his fins and all around health, but I can't see any fin-rot or huge missing parts like on my last betta.

I'll get some photos up of him eventually. I've never seen a betta that had that color of purple on him except in photos. lol

Well, I have all the means to care for him. Back-up meds incase, betta food as I have two other betta in their own tanks, space, heat, plants, filters. Yeah, he'll be happy if he doesn't die from poor shop treatment. x.x
 
#105 ·
Here he is. I got a video of him in the video/photo section titled Orchid Betta NOT sharing or something along those lines. It's kinda funny. But here's a couple photos, I know, not the best. I'm just not that great at getting fish photos. Every so often I get lucky. ^^;
I gotta think up a good name for him. I'm thinking I'll name him after the star Sirius because of his colors. lol




 
#107 ·
Actually, I intend to. But not anytime soon. I know most people do it when they're young, but I don't intend to do it more than once unless I find I have a knack for it. I hate breeding babies. >_>; It just seems off to me, you wouldn't breed a dog at six months of age just because you could. lol I don't see why people do it with fish, you have at least the first couple years, so a few extra months aren't going to hurt them. That's my opinion on the matter anyways. Maybe there's some important reason people do it when they're young, or maybe they can't breed after they're over a year old. I dunno. Which is why I wont breed them, even if I miss the chance, until I know things. xD I can keep betta, but I've never bred them. My grandma wants to, I REALLY didn't before. But I figure if I do well with it, have what I NEED for it first and keep them safe, find nice homes, make a little money, it might just be a tough, but rewarding experience.
I have a lot of money to save up first, and a whole lot of researching to do. I know they need space and are delicate as babies, so I want to be sure I have at least a less chance of messing up that I would just doing it. lol Plus, I want the female to get a little older first, and he needs recovery time after living in a cup. He looks good, all things considered...extremely good. He's energetic, and acts like a betta. lol
 
#109 ·
Oh, now I know why I was confused on his colors. He's more purpley on his other side, but his right side is a nice blue color. lol I kept looking and going "What? I swer there was purple!" But you know, I have my doubts it's gonna stay that way. But then Mister President is blue on one side and green on the other. lol Never know. He started out blue on both sides though.
 
#111 ·
Yeah, you know either way is pretty. lol Rare doesn't always mean better. xD He's kinda...oddly back and forth. Sometimes he looks very bright blue, other times he's a deep violet color. lol

Anywho, we ended up naming him Twilight Sirius. lol My little cousin argued the Twilight thing with me because of his color, so we compromised. Twilight Sirius fits well anyways, what do you think? =p

Well, all my babies are doing good. Growing fast, being active...swarming my poor snails. xD Haven't found any sick, dead or off looking ones, they all are active, bright and busy like ants. =) Usually even in smaller groups I get at least one that seems a bit off, right at the start too. I'm shocked to have none at this point, although the younger ones are still too young to say this for sure. We'll see. I'm going to upload a video for you as well! I've got footage of all three of my tanks. I'm getting miffed at my frog and betta tank though, that darn spot algae is just gross and annoying now. =-= My snails got rid of most of it within the first two days, but it's reared its ugly head again anyways. lol Well, at least I know they'll be well fed! But I still get rid of some myself sometimes. I leave them a little patch of it. Sure, you may think "Leaving some will just make it come back again!" But I've tried fully getting rid of it, it pops right back. It makes my tank glass look smeary. x.x The water is nice and clean though, it just looks bad from the outside. xD

Onto video!

 
#112 · (Edited)
Well now, more babies. lol My other painted swordtail is giving birth today. She started in the main tank, so I probably lost a few, but I did manage to save five of them. Mamma is still going too, and thus far 17 have been born. She's still pretty huge too, so I am estimating somewhere between 20 and 30 left to go. At least compared to my platies size and she gave birth to 36 babies. She was smaller than my swordtail though. I might get more than that. lol

Also, I think my blue MM platy gave birth, she was pretty skinny today, she was fat yesterday. I am thinking one or two of those babies I saved were hers since they weren't red like the swordtails other babies have been.

Hehee, so many babies! ^____^ I'm never gonna have enough room to raise them all, so I will most likely donate about three quarters or more of the babies I have once they get to be bigger than meal sized.

Well, I do have a spot open for one extra. Unfortunately, last night the Dalmation Lyretail I was raising to keep died. He was about an inch and a half long, too big to be eaten, and had lived with my adults for about a month. He decided my filter looked interesting and got hooked to it, and when that happened, my adults all thought he was food stuck in there and went to chew on him. I managed to get him out alive and put him in a net, but he did not survive the night. I was really bummed about it, I called him my little flame tail because he had this black spot/stripe that looked like a flame at the end of his white tail. A real shame that was, he was beautiful.
Well, a bummer indeed. I've never had any of my fish get in the filter like that, wasn't very smart of him. But then he was still smaller. My adults can pick at it just fine.

Oh, speaking of my kept youngsters, that one orange baby wth a big black spot on her tail, I had kept her in a tank with my female platies and swordtails for three extra months past breeding age to let her grow a bit more before the boys ran her down. But now she is in my main tank, and the boys love her, as I thought. lol She seems alright with it, she flirts and invites. So I may get some more youngsters in a month or so, unless she pulls a Creamsicle on me and doesn't have any for four months...and that's fine, it's up to them. =p I haven't seen anyone chasing the spotty one I kept with her though, I am wondering if it is a male...looks fully female to me, do males sometimes mature slower? I'd say they're about 8-9 months old now, its sex should be decided. Maybe she's a late bloomer, which is also fine. lol I like to give the younger ones time to mature their growth better before breeding, even though they wouldn't get that in the wild, in my opinion, it lessens the risk of death in birth or after, less strain on moms still growing body too.

I have a gold dust male in there as well, completely gold, no black spots on him. He has black eyes instead of silver though, so he's got some dust in him, and he was in a group of them. Sometimes they just don't get any spots. lol He's actually a bit smaller than my two younger mollies, just a little bit(in this breed of molly, the males get quite a bit bigger and more square shaped than the females who get longer than wide), but that doesn't stop him from chasing the girls. I don't think I've seen a fish quite so gold. Usually they're more orangey or light yellow, but he is BRIGHT gold, maybe a tad of orange to him. He was a new addition I got to replace one of the two males I lost a bit ago. I figured it'd be nice to have a smaller male instead of all those big sailfins because those usually ignore my smaller mollies. Well, he sure chases after them. xD He also chases after one of my platies, my bumblebee. My younger male swordtail likes three of my mollies and one of my platies as well. And also one of my variatus. Those should be interesting kids if they actually succeed in fertilized eggs over species there...if that makes sense at all how I put it. lol
 
#113 ·
Oh my. Again I say...soooo many babies! :3 My swordtail was having some trouble giving birth last night, she was only passing one or two an hour. And then she started having dead babies and eggs, two dead babies and two eggs that looked half formed. I figured she was done even though still fairly round...I removed those, then ten minutes later nothing so I skittered off. I came back ten minutes later to make myself feel better and there were about thirty six babies in there. Wow, those ones that didn't make it must have been stuck, poor thing. She's still going too. @_@ I'm gonna keep her in there for the day and see how she is later tonight. She's acting extremely tired and awkward, so I'm gonna keep her safe. Once she's done, if she's not by now, she'll have some time to rest. If she's still not well, I'm not sure what I'll do. I dunno if she'll appreciate being in the net, even though the net is rather large and has plants. x.x; I may just block off a small part of the big tank for her, I absolutely don't want the boys or other fish poking her when she's having so much trouble. I hate when they have trouble like this. =( I expect it from ones I buy pregnant, but not so much with ones I've had for a while. Maybe it was her first brood. Here's to hoping she wont have further problems or I'll have to keep her with a girls only group. lol Or it could just be the fact she was in labor all night and had dead babies and eggs blocking the way and then suddenly shot out 36 babies in ten minutes or less....I would die. ^^;
 
#118 ·
Oh, well, I wondered that too. If push came to shove, a few stores near here will take them in and raise them. So that was my initial plan...but fortunately someone who has a lot of tanks and experience decided to go livebearers and bought about 75 from me yesterday. ^_^ lol Good thing too, they may be small, but keeping them much longer is going to be a problem.
 
#121 ·
Well, he said he's got 125 gallon tanks and a 55 gallon and a nursery tank set up in case of babies. lol He's going to pick them all up on Wednesday. I'm very happy, he's been taking care of fish since the mid 90's, so he probably knows even more than I do. lol Afterall, I was still with my little betta friend and learning in Elementary school back then. xD

After this, I think I have enough room to raise what I'll have left. At least for a while longer anyways.
Yes, timing is awesome, because by next Monday, I woulda been taking many to the shop well before I would have liked to. ^^;
 
#123 · (Edited)
LOL well, actually, I do have a blue MM platy that is getting pretty big, I'm keeping an eye on her. Possibly my half black and half gold gold dust molly as well...and MAYBE my Bumblebee. My gold dust is getting a pretty good belly. My last one never showed, but she had two broods with me, one of them was a pretty big brood too, but never once did she look pregnant.

And I have a question: I know some, if not all, corydoras have spines that they can get you with and are poison...my Schwartz cory got me today when I went to move the cave away from the glass so they could get in there better, didn't even see it there, I tapped it so everyone would move, he didn't...and he got me with his pectoral fin really good, and visibly intentionally. Like he jammed it into my finger, I saw him after I swooshed him away after I initially touched him, he came towards my hand with his pectoral fin out. Guess he was mad. LOL
My hand is now extremely sore from fingtertip to mid-arm and feels tingly...am I gonna die? lol My emeralds get me sometimes, usually by user error when I move them. >_>; It's not that bad when they get you, but this one SUCKS! It really hurts. It's like a cross between a bee sting and being hit with a hammer. c.c I barely touched the little booger too, I just didn't want to mush him with the cave. x.x He got me right on the tip of my middle finger, which is now swollen and turning blue in the sting area, I don't see anything stuck, and said little booger is fine and dandy, seems proud of himself and is hanging out with everyone else looking for food. >_>;
 
#124 ·
Well, apparently I'm not going to die, didn't think I was. lol But it seems I've had an allergic reaction to a little sting. x.x Eh well, you know you always deserve it when you stick your hands in there. =p I love the little stinker anyways, he's my bigger male Schwartz cory, and he has actually gone for me before, I've never had one that'd do that. xD Jerk, he's my new favorite cory though.

Anywho, on the fish, turns out the guy wants 80 instead. lol I have some pretties picked out for him as well, he asked me to catch him some with good markings if at all possible, and says he knows they may and probably will change as they grow, but he's looking forward to it. Has a nursery all set up for them as well. I'm so happy I got a buyer that is all set up and knows what he's doing! ^___^
 
#125 ·
OMG! Sylver! What a rough day you've had. Happy to know you aren't dying and all, but sheesh! I've always thought Cories were so cute, I think you've officially convinced me NOT to buy them! I'd be getting stung constantly. . . hope it heals quickly!

Huzzah for 80 babies! Wow. . . I hope he takes great care of them. That'll be an amazing tank. . . or a disaster, lol! Hopefully the former!
 
#126 ·
No no, cores ARE sweet, this one instant was a...well, a rare fluke. They normally wont actually GO for you, in fact it's unheard of, at least far as I have heard and they rarely get you even when you handle them(which you'd have very little reason to, but sometimes they wont get you even then, but for the most part they only sting peopel when they HANDLE them, which was where my first three stings came from). Cories are very sweet, very awesome fish, and unless you're half dead in the brain like I am, I doubt you will ever get stung. I knew someone who had been breeding and caring for cories for a few decades who wasn't even aware they had spines. lol He'd never been stung. Well, he knew they had spines, but he said he'd never have known it if he hadn't studied them.


Anywho, my buyer:

Nah, he's got a bunch of tanks. He's going to divide them up, he's got three 125 gallon tanks, two 55 gallon, and two thirty gallon tanks which he's set up as temporary nurseries until the babies get big enough for the two 55 gallon tanks, and then he'll put most into the 125 gallon tanks. lol

He ended up coming today. He mixed up his days, he thought today was Wednesday! Well, I was not ready. He came an hour late because he said he got lost. Poor fellow. He was VERY kind and knew fish. We talked for a while about our fish and...good and bad experiences in pet shops. He said this one lady catching fish for him did what that lady did to you with your loaches. =-= She beat them out, and shook the net at them. I gasped. I said I woulda yelled at her, he said he went "You know those are living things in there, right?" And he also had someone drop his fish on the floor and ask if he still "Wanted -that-" before picking it up. I can't believe some of the people in this world!

Anyways, he has a tank that has several female Neon Blue Platy. I haven't heard of those, and he said he's hoping some of my swords come out males. Well, I told him I can't guarentee(One gave me a problem catching it, kept dodging, and then wouldn't get out of the net, he said that MUST be a boy LOL), so I offered him the male that I have that was being a problem. I told him, I -think- he's being this way because he just hit sexual maturity and I have an older male. And I said if he wants him, I'll give it to him for free, and that if he continues being a problem, Neptunes will actually BUY it from him or he can bring him back. He said he's absolutely beautiful and he loved it. I also gave him one of my older female mickey mouse juveniles, you know the two red babies I adopted from the shop and raised. =)
Well, this man was nice enough to bring me fry grass. ^____^ That was lovely of him, he said there -might- be pond snails since he had a problem and wasn't sure I'd want it, I told him I have an infestation of assassin snails and that it owuldn't be a problem for long. LOL And asked if he wanted some. ^^; Haha, he didn't want any because he has some snails he wants that assassins can actually kill. Oh well.

Anywho, this guy gave me a little extra money, and I also gave him extra babies. I told him that I didn't have as many mollies as I would have liked to give him, and he said it's ok so long as he gets at least eighty babies. And he was loving it, cute babies I have. He seemed very thrilled about my tanks. Even though he did get me up and I was not ready for him, I was going to clean up today so he could enjoy his visit, which he did anyways...see, I happen to be a slob, but NOBODY knows this but me because I never people see that. Well, I got busted. >___>; And he said "Story of my life!" LOL Anyways, he was happy to take some extra babies, I gave him between 85 and 90, and I still have about a hundred in there. ^^; Or more. But I now have room to raise many more to a better size before I adopt more out, and room to raise my own, and even three spots open for ones I wish to keep. :3

lol My ferrets were trying to pull him in the cage, he loves ferrets, used to have one. So this was an awesome day, and I even made a small amount of money so I can be set if I need to get anything. I am HOPING to get my fifth female betta, and I'd like an orchid female, but those are very, very expensive. x.x But if I get lucky, I can afford it now.

I'm so glad this was an experienced, nice fellow. And he asked great questions about their water to be sure he had what he needed for them. Ended up perfectly. I got some fry grass, which I have been LOOKING for for ages, and it's nice grass, he has good plants. He was very patient with me as well, which is good, because I woke up feeling as if I broke my back. I could barely bend, and I was so embarrassed. c.c But he was very sweet about it and helped me out. Made me feel worse. LOL
 
#127 ·
Hmmmmm... how old was this guy? Because it really sounds like he could be your soulmate! *giggle* I can see it now - tank after tank filled to bursting with livebearer babies, lol! Every wall of the house. . .PLUS an entire fishroom or three ;) Awesome that he took your little trouble maker off your hands, too - and brought you some guppy grass! That was really sweet of him. NEXT time we just need to make sure he knows what day of the week it is! HA!
 
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