Baby Platys soon... What do you do with 'em?

S

shaggyspeedy

AC Members
Apr 14, 2003
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Toledo, OH, USA
www.shagout.net
There will probably be a number of blasphemous things written here, so bear with me.

My wife caught 2 of my Platys doing... ahem... "their thing", and sure enough, the female is pregnant. Since I don't have the resources for a breeding tank (nor the experience to set one up, haven't dealt with real plants yet), I had to resort to getting one of those floating breeder traps (Blasphemy!). The platy looks so sad trapped in there. :(

I've read up on what to feed the fry, and we're going to try to do this as right as we can.

But one burning question remains... what exactly do we do with 'em once they're out of the "getting eaten by mom" phase? Like I said, I don't have the resources to set up another tank, so that's out of the question. My fish store closed, so I'm without a place to sell them for the time being. And I'm sure the landlady wouldn't be too happy with me releasing them in the small pond in the courtyard.

Help?
 
BLASPHEMY! :laugh:

Once they're big enough to avoid being eaten, they can run around in the main tank with the parents. Heck, if you have enough hiding places in the main tank, some will escape long enough to be too big to eat even if you don't use the trap. If you use the trap, just release them into the main tank once they're more than a mouthful.

Too bad you don't have an LFS nearby. There's always the classifieds, like the section on this board.
 
You might ask around the neighborhood, if you're friendly with the neighbors, and see if anybody would like to have them. A friend of mine sets up a pond every summer to breed a species (different one each year), and at the end of the summer, he gives a whole bunch of fish away to kids in the area (who he also schools in Fishkeeping 101, natch). The rest he sells to the LFS, which isn't an option for you, it seems. Although Toledo isn't exactly a backwater burg -- was there really only one LFS in your vicinity?

Thinking long-term, this isn't a one-time "problem" with your platies. Since you've apparently provided them with a nice environment, they'll keep doing their thing, so you'll either have to let the fry be eaten or figure out a reliable place to unload your extra fish.

In the short term, though, good luck with your breeding!
 
I have a 55 gallon tank with lots of tetras, mollies, danio's, platies, etc. and havn't had any problem with them multiplying. Go buy some hornwort from the LFS and allow it to float on the surface. the babies will find this soon and use it as protection from any fish trying to eat them. You probably would be better off if all of them don't survive anyway, I'm already overstocked and will soon be looking for someone to take some of these fish off my hands. I've been pushing my brother-in-law hard to get a tank and take some of these fish off my hands. I wish I had a good cichlid tank to use these as food but I don't have anything that will eat them unless they're tiny babies and these are 1/4" long before I notice them so they're too big already. they multiply fast so be ready if you want to let them survive. Kyle
 
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