mollys and guppies in a reef tank

[N.Sreefer]

as attiland said they can eat their own babies.It's not something uncommon.I had FW about 6-7 years ago and both guppies and mollys(and the rest livebearers) ate their babies in the tank.I don't know how your tank is overcrowded with babies but these babies even if they don't get eaten they need special food.There are many factors that makes them not get full grown.Maybe you are just lucky i don't know,what i believe is that it's not possible that the babies can survive on their own in the main display.Again this is what i believe.If you say that your babies survive i believe you and perhaps you just doing something correct idk.

My tank is pretty crappy compared to others on this site I'm not doing alot right haha. That may be the trick right there I have brown algae red algae and green filamentous algae all in my display which looks horrible but the mollys graze that algae 24/7. My sump has a large rock crab that eats the babies in there and theres still more than I can count in there. I didn't realize they eat babies because ive never witnessed this. Honestly I thought them overpopulating a tank is normal.

 

[SteveMM62Reef]

I noticed in the Florida Keys, the Mollies in Saltwater, are Green Mollies. Never saw a Black Molly there, but saw plenty Black Mollies in Florida fresh water. Also someone told me that a lot of the Mollies in LFS, are hybrids with Platys.

 

[VintageJoy63]

My Mollies have been in 35ppt water for so many generations most have never seen freshwater. They also do NOT have any issue coming to the surface to get food. they are excellent in frag tanks to keep frags 'clean', they spend 99% of their daylight hours looking for food, they are absolute algae vacuum cleaners.

I agree....I had 3 mollies in my tank for well over 16 months, but had a tank issue (due to covid) and lost them and a few of my sw fish also. They were great to watch, ate well and were constantly grazing on algea...even more so than my kole tang. I loved the lacy look of the solid white one best, she showed off against the pretty corals. But the "Dalmatian" one was cool to look at also. He became great friends with my lubbock fairy wrasse, and they'd "tour" the tank together first thing in the morning -scoping out pods - when they saw me awake, eating my bfast...even before the lights went on.

I'll be adding them again once my store gets a batch back in stock. I've never tried guppies, but I'll ask about those, I always say...the more the merrier

 

[Wulfie]

I think it depends on the molly hybrid. I've had a pair of black sailfin mollies in my reef tank for months. They are courting, assertive about feeding...thriving. I've tried to add 2 other females so that the "attention" is spread out. A plain orange female died within hours (after 4 hours of acclimation), a silver sailfin female lived about 8 days before she became crab food. I've read to do no acclimation, 4 hours, 8 hours, a week. Not sure what to think, except that genetics are important. I've not tried a guppy.

 

[Kaboobie]

my experience with acclimating mollies is to do a long one-day drip acclimation then place them in quarantine. Generally, if they survive the night they will be fine to place in the tank after 24 hours in the full salinity quarantine tank. Unfortunately for me I have the angriest clowns in the universe and they kill every other fish and some corals.

 

[Mhamilton0911]

have the angriest clowns in the universe and they kill every other fish and some corals

So you have killer clowns?! Lol

 

[KC's CNC Creations]

my experience with acclimating mollies is to do a long one-day drip acclimation then place them in quarantine..............

there is no reason to QT any fish that was just converted, no parasites or disease that live in FW will survive and transfer to a marine environment.

 

[IamPhins]

I may be way too cautious on it, but I drip them for several days to over a week, not in a matter of hours. I have them in a 20 gallon tank and remove a gallon, raise it's salinity a bit and then drip it right back in. I am running at 1.025 and they breed regularly. Their breeding success increased for me each time, 10 babies the first run, about 50 the second a couple months later, and about 100 this last time. They are amazing algae eaters and along with flake and mysis they will eat seaweed sheets. One of my LFS has started to carry them so I guess they are getting popular. I did it originally as a science project with my daughter. I do seem to get better results with the balloon mollies. I have heard you can do platys as well with about 1/2 the success rate as mollies but I have not felt the need to try them since the mollies have become a productive part of my tanks. I have maxed out what my friends want so now I am allowing most to get eaten and just separate a couple each time to let them grow up. I am assuming they will get more hardy as they become multi-gen but that is hard to say for sure.

You can also just keep a smaller freshwater tank of mollies going and swap over any rocks which have had an algae bloom on them from your main tanks and they will pick it clean in days. I did this for a bit until I established a large enough cleanup crew because I was battling water stability issues while using anti algae supplements.

Sing along with me .... Good golly miss Molly sure likes the salt . . . . .

 

[Shooter6]

I've got black and dalmatian mollies in my 400g sps display with about 70,000gph flow through it. They grow large and strong in sw. Mine have had babies but those end up in the sump, not don't make it through the filter pad area, but I've seen 2 in the cheato basket.

 

[Lost in the Sauce]

What's the process to acclimate them?

I have only ever had success by dropping them straight in. Every acclamation to saltwater I've tried has resulted in quick death. I'm five for five Just dropping.

 

[Critteraholic]

I just started this a couple of months ago to put something in my tank to eat the @#$%@ amphipods. The first time I used guppies cause that's what I had. The guppies started stressing so I stopped the drip and they were ok in a bit. So I would drip for 4 or 5 hours and let them acclimate over night. I didn't get the results I wanted because A) one of the two disappeared overnight, and B) their mouths were too small. I promised guppy #2 I'd put her back in the freshwater tank next day. Got up the next day and the poor dear was floating around the tank with one side looking, I don't know, blistered? rawish? With one disappearing in my pico and this one obviously damaged, I'm thinking a coral zapped them. (I'm looking at you bowerbanki.)

So this time I got myself a large black molly. I'm taking 5 days with her. She should go in this weekend. But, wait, SURPRISE!, there is a juvenile guppy in there with her! I always put rocks and plants in the bucket with fish to help with the stress. This time I grabbed java moss. Apparently there must have been a baby in the moss. I didn't know there was even any in the tank 'cause my spotted raphael goes around hoovering them up at night. I'm still surprised that little baby survived and is growing.

 

[attiland]

there is no reason to QT any fish that was just converted, no parasites or disease that live in FW will survive and transfer to a marine environment.

I am not sure about this since you are converting fw fish to sw and while doing so you may als convert suitable parasites too but likely you are probably right it is less likely to transfer anything.
I am not a QT guy anyway so you can bite my head of for it

 

[attiland]

I just started this a couple of months ago to put something in my tank to eat the @#$%@ amphipods. The first time I used guppies cause that's what I had. The guppies started stressing so I stopped the drip and they were ok in a bit. So I would drip for 4 or 5 hours and let them acclimate over night. I didn't get the results I wanted because A) one of the two disappeared overnight, and B) their mouths were too small. I promised guppy #2 I'd put her back in the freshwater tank next day. Got up the next day and the poor dear was floating around the tank with one side looking, I don't know, blistered? rawish? With one disappearing in my pico and this one obviously damaged, I'm thinking a coral zapped them. (I'm looking at you bowerbanki.)

So this time I got myself a large black molly. I'm taking 5 days with her. She should go in this weekend. But, wait, SURPRISE!, there is a juvenile guppy in there with her! I always put rocks and plants in the bucket with fish to help with the stress. This time I grabbed java moss. Apparently there must have been a baby in the moss. I didn't know there was even any in the tank 'cause my spotted raphael goes around hoovering them up at night. I'm still surprised that little baby survived and is growing.

Live breakers give birth on stress of water parameters change ( usually PH). In their natural environment it is caused by big rainfalls making the environment favour the fry’s survival rate. Of course this is the drop of PH in freshwater but works both ways.

 

[Shooter6]

I've added them 2 ways, and both seem to work about equally. Drop straight in. And added after hyposalinity treatment.
The hypo is post qt treatment of other marine fish. I add mollies to the qt as canaries in the coal mine. They have no immunity to marine parasites or diseases so will show anything external that may be in the qt. Once qt/meds treatments I keep marine fish in hypo for an additional 60 days. At this time I add black mollies. After I raise salinity to 1.028 I maintain the fish in qt for an additional 30 days. Once this is all done I'll transfer the fish to the display.
The display in the vid is new so many fish yet to go through qt, and many mollies to end up being added as well.

 

[Critteraholic]

Live breakers give birth on stress of water parameters change ( usually PH). In their natural environment it is caused by big rainfalls making the environment favour the fry’s survival rate. Of course this is the drop of PH in freshwater but works both ways.

Nah. I guess I wasn't really clear. The two guppies I tried this with were the last two I had. The bucket was cleaned and put away after I put them in the tank. It was a couple of weeks before I got the molly. That little baby was all alone in the FW tank with my 5" catfish and survived! And it must of been hiding in the java moss I grabbed to put in with the molly. And it's still alive! (tough little fishy)

 

[reef4life!!!]

Nah. I guess I wasn't really clear. The two guppies I tried this with were the last two I had. The bucket was cleaned and put away after I put them in the tank. It was a couple of weeks before I got the molly. That little baby was all alone in the FW tank with my 5" catfish and survived! And it must of been hiding in the java moss I grabbed to put in with the molly. And it's still alive! (tough little fishy)

sell that guppie baby for 100euros hahahaha

 

[Shooter6]

I am not sure about this since you are converting fw fish to sw and while doing so you may als convert suitable parasites too but likely you are probably right it is less likely to transfer anything.
I am not a QT guy anyway so you can bite my head of for it

Saltwater parasites explode do to osmosis in freshwater. I believe the same happens to freshwater parasites when added to sw.

 

[Shooter6]

Here's a vid, dont know how to attach a vid directly so I downloaded to YouTube.

 

[Shooter6]

Live breakers give birth on stress of water parameters change ( usually PH). In their natural environment it is caused by big rainfalls making the environment favour the fry’s survival rate. Of course this is the drop of PH in freshwater but works both ways.

Your not implying that they only breed during stress right? My experience has been that live bares like mollies and guppies are either eating or breeding, ( or both at the same time), regardless of a lack of stress-related influences

 

[attiland]

Your not implying that they only breed during stress right? My experience has been that live bares like mollies and guppies are either eating or breeding, ( or both at the same time), regardless of a lack of stress-related influences

I am implying that pregnant mollies or guppies will give birth often immaturely when introduced to new environment or water parameters change rapidly.