I recently moved my fry from a hatchery to a 10 gallon empty tank to grow. I haven't done this in a while and they are one month old right now.
1. How old are the babies when you can determine their gender?
2. How old are they when you see the beginnings of a lyretail?
3. How do you feed 16 fry in a 10 gallon tank?
4. What type of food makes them grow bigger?
5. If they all live, what do I do with 16 baby mollies? At the most, I can only keep 6!
Answers:
1. They should be sexually mature by about 3 months. Males who are not sexually mature will look like females, so even if you can see the anal fins at a young age, it might not be what it looks like it is.
2. Not sure.
3. I'd do a small pinch (kind of grounded up between your fingers) of tropical fish flakes. They sell fry food that claims to make the baby grow fast, but it's just a gimmick to make money. Of all the ones I've used I haven't noticed any difference.
4. I think anything that claims it'll make them bigger is another gimmick. I think its how often you feed them that is going to make them grow bigger and faster. I'd feed them a tiny bit 3-5 times a day.
5. Well see if you can find friends who want them or advertise them as free on your local craigslist - because that's honestly the only way you are going to get rid of them, unless you don't mind them being fed to bigger fish. Fish stores are not going to want to buy them since they breed so easily. If a fish store does accept them, (as in they might take them from you for free), they'll prob just feed them to some bigger fish.
I just had baby dalmation mollies, they are a little over a week old, I only had five because somehow the petstore gave the mother to me while she was in mid delivery withought noticing. I feed my baby fish very finely grounded fish flakes 2-3 times a day. Petstores will usually accept fish.
The second web page I found most interesting and tells the important food to give or conditions. Perhaps you could donate some of the mollies to a school project, a local library, or doctors office? If you don't have the correct food and conditions you won't have that many left over.
