sunburst platy question

[cougargirl50]

Hi my friend has 2 sunburst platy's in their tank, and one is bigger (which we take it is the girl) and one that is alot thinner (taking it that one is a male) the male follows the female around everywhere. It kinda looks like a whale and a baby swimming in the ocean.
The smaller thinner one won't let it alone. Its not biting at it or anything. It just swims with it everywhere it goes.
Is this a sign it wants to mate or is it something else??

Thanks :girl:

 

[Rebgen]

Hi my friend has 2 sunburst platy's in their tank, and one is bigger (which we take it is the girl) and one that is alot thinner (taking it that one is a male) the male follows the female around everywhere. It kinda looks like a whale and a baby swimming in the ocean.
The smaller thinner one won't let it alone. Its not biting at it or anything. It just swims with it everywhere it goes.
Is this a sign it wants to mate or is it something else??

Thanks :girl:

They're doing the mating dance. In a month or so you'll have little ones swimming around....assuming they don't get snacked on first. To give the female a break you might consider adding a couple more female Sunburst to the tank.

 

[RanchuRick]

I'll second that. I have two males chasing six females all around. The males really don't pick on any specific females. They just follow whoever they happen to bump into.

 

[tricksterpup]

Hi my friend has 2 sunburst platy's in their tank, and one is bigger (which we take it is the girl) and one that is alot thinner (taking it that one is a male) the male follows the female around everywhere. It kinda looks like a whale and a baby swimming in the ocean.
The smaller thinner one won't let it alone. Its not biting at it or anything. It just swims with it everywhere it goes.
Is this a sign it wants to mate or is it something else??

Thanks :girl:

Males chasing females is very normal behaviour. No harm is being done here. all he wants to do is pass on his genetics and breed.

Here is an image of a male. IF you notice the bottom fin is much different than that of the female's.

Females:

 

[cougargirl50]

Ok mating dance woo hoo. So if they are going to do the mating thing, there is only 2 small plants in the tank. Is there something that should be gotten to place in there for the babies (if that happens?))

 

[cohazard]

If you want to keep the offspring, you should go to the store and buy a breeder net, and fill it with Java moss, or some sort of soft floss or something similar.

Then place the pregnant female in there, and when she has the babies eventually, the babies will hide in the java moss/floss/etc.... where the mother can't eat them.


HTH,
Serg

 

[Rebgen]

Hornwort, java moss, etc. are some plants that would give your fry some cover. If your priority is to preserve as many fry as possible then I'd recommend either removing the adults from the tank shortly after birth, or remove the fry and let them grow a little bigger in another tank. Mom and Dad do an excellent job snacking on the "kids". I watched my first fry drop a couple of months ago (Sunset platy too) and some of my fry were born and within less than 1 second made the trip to Mom's tummy.

Good luck and have fun!

 

[tricksterpup]

If you want to keep the offspring, you should go to the store and buy a breeder net, and fill it with Java moss, or some sort of soft floss or something similar.

Then place the pregnant female in there, and when she has the babies eventually, the babies will hide in the java moss/floss/etc.... where the mother can't eat them.


HTH,
Serg

Actually, This is good advice but only so far. The breeder net causes more problems than it helps. This causes the fish to stress out and abort the fry and can also kill her due to the stress. The best thing to do is to remove the adults or fry when they are born. The best plants I love using to raise my fish is Hornwort. It floats on the top of the water column and allows the fry to hide on the top of the water and the females to hide as well to give birth. It is also a relatively cheap plant that every pet store has. I personally prefer to catch my fry and place them in another tank. But for my other smaller live bearers, such as my guppies, endlers and hets, I tend to keep them in with the parents. I have tons of fry and most grow to adulthood. I have a 29 gallon tank filled with adult swordtails that I am planning on breeding using this method. i want to see if how well they, larger live bearers, breed in this setup.

 

[RanchuRick]

I will also testify against breeding net for the mother to give birth in. It is way too small. I bought a 10G breeding tank with one side filled with java moss. However, two females were ready to give birth at about the same time. I had to put one in the 10G and the other in a breeding net in the main tank. She got so stressed out that she only gave birth to one live fry, AND SHE DEVELOPED ICK! I had to perform the salt treatment to the main tank to remedy it.

On the other hand, the female in the 10G gave birth to several fries and she has more to come as we can still see some black eyes in her tummy. Java moss is a wonderful hiding place for the fries. Some of the fries are big enough now that they are swiming in the open. Another bonus with the java moss is that my daughter loves to play find-the-baby-fish-in-the-plant.

 

[cohazard]

Well the net has worked very well for me. The female does seem a little distressed when first placed in it, but settles down after a while. As soon as she has the babies, I take her out of the net. I've never experienced fry abortion from using this method, or an ich outbreak with the female. Also, I only put the female in the net when I can clearly see the eyes of the fry in her belly. (Obviously, that's not possibly with some types of platies).

I concede, this isn't the best solution for platy delivery, but if you want to save the babies from being eaten in a community tank, and don't have an extra 10g just for fry rearing, it works out well enough.

As the fry grow, I remove more and more java moss, giving them space to swim and develop. When they're large enough, they either are given to good homes, fed to larger fish, or kept in the main tank.


Serg