When will she drop?
 

I have a pregnant platy that is now quite large. Her gravid spot has gotten a lot bigger and darker and she is starting to have white feces. She isn't show any other classic signs though. When or How long should I wait to put her in the breeding box and how long can she stay in there?

I would expect probably in the next week or so but than I am still trying to get the fine art of determing this myself down. Most females as they get closer to being ready to drop will start to look more square than round. This can be seen while looking at the side of the fish. I would also keep an eye out for the other signs. The one thing I might be concerend about is the white feces. What are you feeding her? Also the feces is it coming out thick like the rest of her feces has been or is it stringy. Sometimes white feces can be a sign of an internal parasite or bacterial infection, especially if stringy. Also is she having the white feces all the time or sometimes? Don't want to make you worry unnecesarrily, but do want to make sure explore all options. As for the breeding box I would wait until she starts showing more of the signs. You really don't want to keep her in there for more than a few days, because this can be very stressful on the fish.

I haven't noticed anymore of the white feces. I believe I read somewhere that this is a sign of birth, or seeing something white so I assumed maybe she was about ready. I still can't tell if shes about ready or not. Shes awfully large now, and the gravid spot is getting darker. Occassionally she does hide under filter and gets rather defensive towards other fish if shes in a hiding spot. But than other times she acts completly normal and doesnt show any signs. I just don't want her to drop when I'm not at home and miss out on the experience.

Here's picks of her!

She also has a little white thing hanging where I would suspect they give birth. Lol! Getting impatient. Thanks for any input!

Sounds like she is getting very close, sometimes you can see the white tube in the back when they are getting close. If you see this tonight, if you want you could place her in tonight. Most livebearers tend to drop their fry in the early morning. The behavior of the aggressiveness and the hiding are also classic signs that she is getting close. Good luck :-D If you do put her in now if she does not drop in the next few days you might want to consider taking her back out so that she doesn't become overly stressed.

She did have them last night. They were all stil lborn, except for maybe two swimmers. But they ended up dieing off as well. She appeared to be done so I release her back into the community tank.

When you use a breeding box, how would one go about cleaning it out the four weeks the fry are in there, and how would you removed the dead fry from the live ones since they are so tiny? I was asking myself this last night.

It was very cool to see her giving birth last night, even though I didn't get any fry out of it. Perhaps another time! :(

I myself do not use the plastic breeding boxes so I have not had to worry about how to change out the water. If you are thinking of using a breeder what I would suggest is the breeding nets that are available. They are a mesh net that fits over a plastic frame and hangs off the side of the tank. It allows water from the tank to circulate through it and will keep the water from becoming stagnant. For removing the dead fry from the live ones you can you a piece of rigid airline tubing to siphon them up with. Sorry that this batch was not successful, but there will be more babies in about 3 to 4 weeks.