Balloon Molly Pregnant? Sick? Stressed? Dying? Please help?
Hey, I have a 40 gallon tank. This is what I have in it.
7 neon tetras, 2 balloon mollys, 2 sunburst platys, 2 guppys, 2 dwarf gouramis, 2 dalmation mollys, 3 glass fish, 1 rainbow shark, 1 golden alga eater, and 1 rubber lip pleco …
They all get along great, except at first the rainbow shark and golden algae eater battled it out for a cove.
As well, the bigger dalmation molly kept biting at the White balloon mollys butt lookin like he was trying to eat his poo.
The white molly looks significantly fatter than the yellow one, and by reading about gendering i figured out the white molly is a female, the other is a male but they don’t hang around eachother too much. As of recently.. meaning the last day (my tank is only 3 days old), the white baloon molly is hiding at the bottom not eating, swimming weirdly and even hides in coves and under rocks or wherever she can go without being hassled by the bottom fish who already have their homes established. Why is she acting this way? Hiding under rocks, swimming weirdly, not eating, avoiding other fish? Is she pregnant? I look at her butt and it looks like her butthole is stretched big where the poo looks to come out but i can’t see the black spot for pregnancy really.. so I don’t know what’s going on?
Please help, I don’t want an early casualty
for the record, the tankw ater has been tested seevral times and has perfect stats. (ph, hardness, acidity, etc, etc,) and the rainbow shark only grows to 6 inches, depending on it’s environment and it will fit perfectly fine into the 40 gallon tank with everything. As well, finally to clear up I have been cycling and the rubber lip pleco only grows to 4 inches. Once again, seeing as it is a bottom feeder, it will not have any drastic effect on the other fish. The only one I worry about is the chinese algae eater, but if needed I will get rid of him. So please, people stop telling me about cycline and water scenarios because everything is perfect, I am asking about a fish.
Consider getting rid of the pleco and the shark. Those fish will get too large for your tank. If you have only had them for 3 days, your pet shop may take them back. They never should have sold them to you in the first place.
Also, I will include a link below on how to cycle a tank. You will more than likely have some casualty. You should have started with fewer fish and added slowly.
I will not go into how the cycle process works here because it is just too lenghty, but in short, you need to change 30% of your tank water about 3 times weekly for about 2 months. You will also need a test kit to test for ammonia, nitrite, nitrate and ph. This is explained in the link.
After the initial cycle process, you will only have to change 15% of the water weekly and the maintance will be much easier, so please don’t panic. You will do fine.
Good Luck
You say this tank is 3 days old did you cycle it for 6 weeks before putting fish in it, and change 15-20% of the water each week if not this could also be your problem. She could very well be expecting but if you have not cycled you also may have more casualties.
When purchasing new fish in the future you will have to quarantine for up to 14 days.
Good luck hope all goes well
for the record you have far too many fish in a 3 day old tank-people are telling you about cycling as you obviously don’t know much about it.being rude to people that have given you good answers isn’t going to help you any-the stats of interest are not the ones you mention and there’s no way your stats are perfect after adding all those fish to a tank 3 days ago.
MAYBE SHE IS JUST ALITTLE STRESSED AND SHE JUST WOULD JUST LIKE TO BE ALONE, BUT THEY WOULD ASLO MIGHT BE PREGNANT.
I’ve never actually had luck seeing the gravid spot on white mollies but if she’s female, chances are, she’s pregnant. They are livebearers and breed like no tomorrow, being able to hold sperm up to 6 batches of fry!
Symptoms besides the big belly (and gravid spot but since you can’t see it) are lack of appetite/energy, and hiding.
Mollies typically give birth every 28 days. However, this is only a general statement. Some have taken up to 3 months to give birth! If you want to keep the fry (baby fish), I would recommend moving her to a new tank. The tank doesn’t have to be heated or filtered. (Especially not filtered, since the fry can get sucked up). Fill it with LOTS of live plants. I prefer live because they provide natural source of oxygen. Another reason plants should be there are because they provide hiding places for the fry. =] The mother will be really hungry after she gives birth and the fry are easy pickings.
After she gives birth, move her to another tank or container. It can be a cleaned out milk carton. She just needs a place to rest after labor without being able to get to the fry. I recommend you put her there for 24 hours. Any sooner than that and you reintroduce her to the male, she may get chased and potentially die. Please also understand that it is not uncommon for her to die after labor no matter what you do. After all, they do produce up more than 100 fry sometimes (usually, not all of them survive).
Good luck! =]
You didn’t ask the question properly and then you get stroppy
that people have answered on the basis of your post.
You are obviously an expert maybe you could explain to us idiots what constitutes perfect pH, hardness, alkalinty etc etc as I am not aware what they might be when you have multiple species in the same tank
The stats I think people might be interested in are Ammonia, Nitrite and nitrate. You have claimed the tank is only 3 days old
so what are the values today?
All the behaviour you have listed is indicative of an ammonia/nitrite spike which will occur when a new aquarium is stocked too quickly and a cycled filter gets overloaded but as you know better ………