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Males and females in different tanks?

5.5K views 30 replies 4 participants last post by  alysalouise  
#1 ·
So i want to breed all my fish, and my friend is letting my borrow her entire 10 gallon tank set up since she just recently lost all of her fish. I was wondering if i should seperate the males from the females of all breeds for a week to encourage them to breed? I will be feeding them flake food and miday meal is usually brine shrimp with my salt water fish as well. So if i do seperate them, so i keep the males in the 29 gallon tank that i want to breed them in, and reintroduce the females to them after a week, or since i have more females than males should i keep the females in the 29 gallon and after a week introduce them to the males in the 10 gallon (I will introduce one female breed to the males at a time)


And will Black Mollies and Silver Mollies spawn?
 
#2 ·
All mollies will spawn with any molly (or guppy) of the opposite sex (sailfin, balloon, lyretail, cremecicle, black, silver, dalmation...). Be careful not to breed a male molly and a female guppy, as a female guppy trying to birth such large fry can and will kill her. Also, muppies, are infertile and cannot reproduce. Also have heard that muppies have short lifespans, but havent gotten confirmation on that one.

Breeding guppies is really easy, and the use of multiple tanks is up to you, but encouragement for these little rabbit-like breeders isnt needed. (I think I read a previous post by you talking about breeding your guppies.)

Are there any other fish species in the 29 gallon? As if you have more males, I'd keep them in the 29. I'd keep the females in the 10. And I would pick which male you want traits to continue of, and add him to the female tank for a few hours, then remove him. Watch for gravid spot (if we are talking guppies still), and then put the pregnant guppy in her own tank or in a breeder net, let her have the babies, then remove her and rear the fry with First Bites, fry food (dust like), or very crushed flakes.

This is just my opinion on what I would do if what you are trying to accomplish was my goal as well. As I believe this route is the easiest and is likely to ensure the survival of a higher number of fry as well as the ease of sureness that the intended male is used in breeding.
 
#3 ·
Well this is what i have as far as breeding would go
4 female guppies
2 male guppies
3 female silver mollies
2 female black mollies(im pretty sure)
1 male black mollie(im pretty sure)
5 female danios
3 male danios
2 female platys
1 male platy( who shows ABSOULTLY NO interest in my females... so im going to be buying 3 more platys when i get the money 2 females and then a male)
1 female fathead minnow
1 male fathead minnow


And i do have first bites that i got like a month ago when i had 60-70 zebra danio fry, and am using it on my 3 baby platys. i also crushed up my flake food just as fine as the first bites and mixed it together today (i have like 3 different kinds of fish flakes mixed together)
 
#6 ·
Not too sure on exactly when they start showing colors on platy fry. I can say that I have guppy fry that I have had for like 3 weeks, and they were already like 2 weeks old when I got them...and they still havent started showing colors. I have heard...dont quote me on this...that it might take up until 3-4 months for full colors and able to sex...or maybe that was the time frame before they were sexually mature? Hmm...dont know...try googling it.

Well, I will say that without the proper temps no species is more likely to breed. I suspect that once you have the heater on the tank, and the minnows in a cooler tank, that you will get more action that you are seeing now.
 
#7 ·
well inside my tank it stays at 76 it was even at 80 yesterday, but i did some water changes and it cooled down, im pretty sure it stays so high because i have a 55gallon tank right next to it at 80-82 and on my dresser on a different wall my 14 gallon is set a 80-82. and my bedroom window and door are always shut, and the heater in the house is usually always on, so my room is kept quite warm, and the 10 gallon im going to be borrowing will also have a heater..... i could always tape my heating pad that i had for when i had lizards a while back into my 29 gallon to keep it a tad bit warmer, but i dont think it is nessacery
 
#8 ·
My platy fry all have some color at birth, but it gets more intense over time. They should be full color, or close to it, by two months. The first platy fry I noticed in my community tank was a yellow-gold color when I first saw him, with no mickey mouse spot, although his mom is an orange/red mickey mouse. He is now about 6 1/2 months old, and he is more intensely colored than the females, and does have the MM markings. I thought at first that he was the only fry born, because I never saw any others. I have since discovered that he was way too big for a newborn platy - he was probably at least 10 days old, maybe as old as 2 1/2 weeks when I noticed him, and I assume he had siblings who didn't make it in the tank. A few days after I first saw him, I picked up 3 neon black painted platy fry (yellow/gold to pale orange where they didn't have the neon black scales) a bit smaller than he was, and another that was at the time yellow. He is now bright orange/red, and the 3 neon black painteds are orange to red where they aren't neon black.

I have about 75-80 platy fry at the moment, from two drops. The older ones are 37 days old, and are mostly yellow, which they were at birth. Some are beginning to show darker shades of gold and orange. Their mother is a sunset platy, and their father is either the bright orange platy or the orange/red mickey mouse, probably the mickey mouse. Therefore, they could end up anywhere from the yellow blending to orange (front to back) of their mother, or a darker, brighter orange, with or without the MM markings. The younger fry are about 3 1/2 weeks old, and most of them have the neon black scales, with various shades from yellow to dark orange on the rest of their bodies. The black scales were evident at birth, and the areas that weren't black were whitish to yellow. Some are already quite orange. Their mother was an orange/red mickey mouse, so obviously their father was the male neon black painted platy.
 
#11 ·
here are my fish, you can obviously tell what 2 guppies are my males, and then the red platy with black fins is my male platy the other 2 are my females
the yellowish female it is hard to see her gravid spot if she isnt swimming the right way when your looking at her
 

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#17 · (Edited)
I meant to answer this last night, but somehow it got lost in the shuffle. You do have beautiful males. The cobra pattern of coloration is best shown in your second to last photo. He is gorgous! I've heard the pattern of the other male's tail described as "grass." I've read explanations about why, but I don't recall them.

As for your question about how soon to expect fry, I'd say none of the females in your photos are very close to giving birth. The one who looks closest is the Tequila Sunrise guppy girl. I'd say she may be a few days to a week or so from birthing. When she's ready, she'll look like she's going to burst. From the front, she will look like a fat whale, and from the side, her belly will be bulging considerably, from right behind her chin. Her gravid spot will be bigger and darker, and you may see shiny baby eyes through her skin. She may separate herself from her tankmates - mine tend to go to corners near the surface, and/or in or near plants. She may not seem interested in food, and she may rock from side to side slightly when swimming - sort of like the waddle of a very pregnant woman. All of these things will be true for your other guppies and the platys as they get close to giving birth. The biggest difference I see in the two species, in terms of pregnancy and birth, is that the gravid spots are visible in female guppies from a few weeks after birth, whereas the gravid spot doesn't become really obvioius in platys until part way through the pregnancy.

By the way, female guppies give off a pheromone for the first 24 hours after giving birth, to let the males know they are again "available," so to speak. If you notice your males chasing one of the females very closely and persistently, especially if they are "double-teaming" her, you may have missed the birth, so start looking for fry!

Good luck with them, and I look forward to seeing pictures of the babies.

Edit: I love your platys, too. Your mickey mouse has the most round mickey mouse spots I've ever seen, and I like the color combo.
 
#13 ·
@alysalouise... those are some very handsome cobra male guppies!!! I could kick myself for not buying any when my petsmart got them in last week, as there all gone when I went back this week.

@amythest123... Yeah, I am just guessing at their age when I got them, so I cant be sure. But the largest of the 3 remaining (there was originally 6), I think it is a male, and look like he might be a phantom as he looks to be getting a black tail in. I noticed the 2nd largest seems to have a bright yellow coloring on the tail (so possibly a laserbeam/yellow). The third is still much smaller in size compared to the other two. The largest is about... (hold on, walking to tank with measureing tape)... the largest is just short of an inch from head to tip of tail...the smallest is under 1/2", and the middle one is almost 3/4". The largest is kind of a bully and likes to chase the others around all the time. If it is viewable to sex at this point i cant, as my eyesight isnt that great, so I will have to wait until they are much larger and more colored and formed. On the other thread where we were talking about my new 15 gallon tank, I had just said I would move them when they were 3/4"-1", but after seeing just how small that size really is, I will be holding off as they still just look like tiny fry to me.
 
#14 ·
@alysalouise... those are some very handsome cobra male guppies!!! I could kick myself for not buying any when my petsmart got them in last week, as there all gone when I went back this week.

@amythest123... Yeah, I am just guessing at their age when I got them, so I cant be sure. But the largest of the 3 remaining (there was originally 6), I think it is a male, and look like he might be a phantom as he looks to be getting a black tail in. I noticed the 2nd largest seems to have a bright yellow coloring on the tail (so possibly a laserbeam/yellow). The third is still much smaller in size compared to the other two. The largest is about... (hold on, walking to tank with measureing tape)... the largest is just short of an inch from head to tip of tail...the smallest is under 1/2", and the middle one is almost 3/4". The largest is kind of a bully and likes to chase the others around all the time. If it is viewable to sex at this point i cant, as my eyesight isnt that great, so I will have to wait until they are much larger and more colored and formed. On the other thread where we were talking about my new 15 gallon tank, I had just said I would move them when they were 3/4"-1", but after seeing just how small that size really is, I will be holding off as they still just look like tiny fry to me.

I didnt know what they were, haha i got them from a fish store that had like hunderes of tanks set up haha, and they had like 4 big tanks, probably 30gallons of just guppies, 2 female tanks 2 male tanks, and the person that helped me made sure i got the prettiest and healthiest males

hopefull my females will throw some real pretty ones fromt those 2 males and maybe i could find people to sell them to
 
#21 ·
I don't know, but according to her roundness she doesn't look that pregnant to me, and I'm not seeing the gravid spot vey clearly. Doesn't mean it's not there, it may be more obvious in person, so to speak. When she's ready to give birth, she'll be significantly wider than she or others usually are, as well as her belly protruding significantly from her jawline from side view. She'll look almost as wide from front or rearview as she is top to bottom from sideview, and the rectangular shape will be more toward the back, near the vent. Check out the photo of the orange/red platy on the platy profile page. She looks pregnant to me, but actually doesn't look as pregnant as I've seen some of mine looking. Others have given birth looking less pg than the one in the photo. Keep watching her, separate her if she gets much bigger, and if she seems suddenly smaller/thinner, look for babies. Good luck!
 
#24 ·
Okay, ya her gravid spot is pretty large in real life, and my other female that popped out 3 babies without my knowledge didnt change in size at all, thats why i couldnt figure out where they came from, but she was my only female platy at the time(and the babies are looking great :) getting bigger by the second)
and after i got those 3 babies thats when i decided on buying more males and females but i got 1 more male than i wanted thanks to the associate who made a mistake, it was rather late at night so the normal associates that help me in the fish section werent there. And this lady didnt know fish, i even pointed out what 2 fish out of the tank, and there was only 5 and 1 decor in the tank, but she still managed to get 2 males instead of one, but oh well i will live, they are rather pretty males i might say, one even looks to be a platy/sword cross, its bottom half of his tail fin looks slightly longer than the rest, ill try to get a picture later and post. :)
 
#22 ·
I dont know why you guys kept wasting your time. I have a pair of Dalmatian fish, I just observed they kept on giving birth and always get eaten by the other fish but I never cared because i enjoyed seeing the way they get eaten. One day out of the blue, I saw like 4 extra Dalmatian fishes swimming up to eat the food. They almost looked like young adult.

I was so surprised since I did not even do anything, never changed the water in 6 months, instead I always add water. Now the 4 dalmatian are really growing and swimming about like the rest.
 
#23 ·
I dont know why you guys kept wasting your time. I have a pair of Dalmatian fish, I just observed they kept on giving birth and always get eaten by the other fish but I never cared because i enjoyed seeing the way they get eaten. One day out of the blue, I saw like 4 extra Dalmatian fishes swimming up to eat the food. They almost looked like young adult.

I was so surprised since I did not even do anything, never changed the water in 6 months, instead I always add water. Now the 4 dalmatian are really growing and swimming about like the rest.

Wasting my time? Im not wasting my time, im using up all my extra time. and having fun with it. I enjoy breeding my fish, some people like you dont but others like me do thank you very much