Our newly purchased lyretail molly unexpectedly gave birth to about 20 fry a little over a month ago. She has a beautiful lyretail, but the fry all have normal-shaped molly tails. Since the mother got amorous in a pet store tank containing a mixture of lyretail and non-lyretail, I suppose it's possible that none of these will turn out with lyretails.
My question is: How long do I have to wait to be sure? We can't keep all 20 fry, and I have some homes lined up for many of them, but we'd like the two or three we keep to be lyretails as well. Does the lyretail develop later, or are the fry old enough to tell now?
2007-08-16 01:24:32 · 4 answers · asked by John 1 in Pets ➔ Fish
The lyretail really doesn't develop until the babies are about 1/2 adult size. That could take as little as 3 months, but often closer to 4. If you watch very closely you can see hits form earlier than that in the form of thickening along the edges of the tail fin as well as a rather flat end to the tail rather than the more smoothly rounded end found on "regular" tail types.
MM
2007-08-16 01:45:03 · answer #1 · answered by magicman116 7 · 1⤊ 0⤋
The best thing to do would be to call a fish store - not just a pet store and talk to a stock boy or someone that knows nothing about fish. There are specialty fish stores that would know exactly what you're talking about
2007-08-16 08:33:34 · answer #2 · answered by Kimmy 4 · 0⤊ 0⤋
I don't know anything about what your asking, but I wanted to let you know I used to have a huge 55 gallon tank. My fish never had babies. You are so lucky. I hope they all live and that your tank stays clean all the time without you having to do it. Here is a star for your new babies.
2007-08-16 08:30:31 · answer #3 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
When it is sexually mature.
2007-08-16 10:50:59 · answer #4 · answered by Jayhawks#1 2 · 0⤊ 0⤋