[mr_bob]

I have a pretty good set of sunburst platies that just cant seem to stop producing.

so i thought i would try and breed some and see if i couldnt make some money off them.

my question is at what point do i need to pull the prego fish and put them in a seperate tank to birth the fish??? I have been pulling them out but always seem to be way too early. just wondering if there are any signs that she is in labor or about to be in labor?


oh and one other thing how big should they be before i start giving them away or giving them to the lfs?

 

[treasy]

Typically they will start to "square off" on the bottom and that's about when they're ready to give birth. If you've had the platies give birth before, try to write the birth date down and then approximately 28 or so days laters she will be due again.

You'll end up with a lot of fish this way, and since livebearers are so easy to breed the fish aren't worth too much. I've never tried selling them to a fish store, though.

 

[Abrium]

As far as making money off of them... They are so easy to breed that you will find yourself having to give them away rather than selling them and even then half the time they won't be accepted. At least that is my experience. I mean if there was ever a definition of prolific platy breeding would be part of the definition...

 

[[email protected]]

People are missing the main point. He's got fish that won't stop breeding. Trying to force them to breed to make money will cause them to stop. Problem solved. ;-)

 

[zoea]

I have mollies which are basically the same thing and when a female gets pretty fat I move her to a separate 10 gallon tank and that way she has a few days to settle thus keeping her from losing a few during the birth because of stress. Just make sure she has some plants to keep her happy and maybe a few danios or neon tetras, most people don't realize that preggo mollies alone can stress but dither fish in their birthing tank can help out tremendously. The dither fish must be smaller and not able to eat the fry, and of another species, some mollies get aggressive with their own species when moved into a new tank and try to form a new pecking order. Good luck!

Ps remember alot of plants so the mom doesnt eat the babies too! Silk plants are better than plastic, rarely a hungry mom can get her eye poked out trying to eat her own babies that hide on plastic plants!