Unwanted Molly Breeding

Question
Hello.  I have a 37 gallon tank with silver lyretail mollies, neon tetras, and gouramis.  When I purchased my mollies, I knew that they were extremely easy to breed, so I requested they be all the same sex, and the store only had females, so I bought 5 females.  Two were pregnant!  Now I have 5 molly babies of both sexes, and one of my female babies is now pregnant.  Is there any way to stop them from breeding? I really didn't want to have to deal with this which is why I wanted all of the same sex.  Although they are so beautiful I didn't want a tank full of mollies.  Can you offer any help?

Thank you,

Jennifer

Answer
Jennifer,   First you need to sex them. It is relatively easy. In the male its anal fin in the middle on the bottom is straight it is a gonopodium. In the female there are two fanned out regular fins. Mollies can store the milt or sperm for a few months so even after they are separated they may have fry one more time. As far as not wanting a tank full of Mollies' they will find hiding spots when they are ready to free from the breeder and let nature take its course. One day you will look and there will be a couple new Mollies'. Good Luck, Tina

Jennifer, You are going to have to sex them and separate them. It sounds like you got them at a Petsmart or Petco where yes they do keep either male or female rodents. Not their fish they are mixed so are their birds and reptiles. The birds unless its a parakeet they can guess by beak covering color anything else would require handling and trust me it is rare to get anyone that can do it at these store......the bigger birds only by blood test. The reptiles can only be sexed as they reach sexually maturity and they have to know how .... there are several different ways to sex depending on the reptile. So the only thing they carry that can be positively sexed is rodents. If you get the right person platy's, mollie's, swordtails, fancy guppie's can all be sexed relatively easily. Don't believe everything they tell you. Do your homework and you will be able to pick out your fish and sex them so this doesn't happen again. Good Luck, Tina