breeding platies

Question
I bought three sunburst platy fish and a five gallon tank two days ago, next thing i know there's a dead fish with a dark spot on one side and two baby fish. The next day THERE'S MORE OF THEM!!!!. What do i do? Do i have to worry about the babies living or can they do that on their own? Do i have to feed them and what? Do i have to worry about the other big fish eating them? How many babies will I expect? I can do anything but catch the babies.
        sincerly, Rebecca
P.S. HELP!!!!!!!!!!!!:{

Answer
Hello!

I'll go through and answer your questions one at a time.

The babies will likely not live. You must take them aside if you want them to live. I strongly recommend a floating breeding cage. You can buy them for about $5 at most pet stores.

You must feed them if you are going to catch them. You can buy fry food at any pet store, but if really finely crushing flake food works well too.

Yes, the bigger fish will try to eat them.

Each female will have between 10-50 babies every 4-5 weeks. Many of these may be eaten soon after birth however.

You must try to catch them. If you have a very heavily planted tank, they can probably survive for a week or two, sometimes if your tank is really heavily planted they can survive to adulthood, however cases like these are few and far between. Try using your gravel vac to suck it up, it doesn't hurt the fish, they are small enough to fit through the pipes.

-Nick