Livebearer Tank Stocking/Size

[quikv6]

Hello all. I'd appreciate some insight:

I started this hobby with livebearers early this year (5 Balloon Mollies and 3 Platies...1 Male in each group), in a 20 gallon. As you can probably guess, these 8 "rabbits" forced a tank upgrade twice. I went to a 40 Long, and am now at at 75 gallon.

Now the 8 adults are alongside approximately 60+ children. None of them are yet full grown, but a batch is getting close. I feel like the tank walls are closing in. Ultimately I plan to get a 125, but don't have room for anything larger than that. As it is, I let nature take its course. With so many babies around, constant food, and cover...the babies are thriving. (Deep down, I am actually glad for that.)

I do have a local fish store that said they'd take any I didn't want, but to be honest, their livebearer tanks don't look so great, and I just don't feel good about bringing the fish to a sub-par environment.

- At what point would you say a 75 is too small? How bout at 125?

I have been on top of maintenance/water changes, have good filtration, and plan to stay on top of that. My ultimate goal is to just let a tank "be", and not have to worry about if each batch of fry is going to put it over the edge, stocking level-wise. And to be honest, I really like keeping the babies, seeing them grow, and am not too keen on giving them away.

Any suggestions, advice, or empathy appreciated. 🙂  Thanks.

 

[lefty o]

i feel for you, ive given away thousands of guppy, and pleco babies. when it looks crowded, and the water parameters start going wonky, then you know you have too many.

[Nataku]

Fish reproducing in your tanks is truly a wonderful thing to watch. But, we must be mindful caretakers. If you leave them be, ultimately they will reproduce to a point where they will affect the water parameters for the worse. Then they'll start dieing and disease usually breaks out. They still don't stop breeding though,  so the spiral continues, its rather vicious.  Eventually, you must make the decision of how to curb the population.  You can do that by either removing fry and selling/giving them to other hobbyists and LFS. You can get some population control fish ie predators who will eat the fry to keep the number being produced and making it to adulthood lower. You could also get two tanks and separate males from the females. Just be aware the females who have already bred will carry sperm and can have several more litters for the following several months. Those fry will also need to be sorted out by gender as soon as you can tell.

[quikv6]

Thanks for the advice and suggestions. I was hoping there would be some magical answer such as "the fish realize the tank is getting full, and slow down on their own."  Wishful thinking.

I guess the 125 will be in my near future, and then after that, I will do my best to find other good homes for them, with the mindset that it is doing them no good to keep them in an overcrowded tank.

Thanks again. Greatly appreciated.

[Kirsten]

If it's any consolation, I see live fish for sale all the time on etsy and ebay for the cost of S&H plus a little. If you're willing to stock up on shipping supplies, it might be worth your while.

[quikv6]

Thanks Kirsten. I never really considered shipping, though I certainly won't rule it out.  As silly as it sounds, I think I'd be more than happy to give them away locally if I knew they'd be going to a good home. I'm going to expand the LFS search, and see if I can come up with a better resource for rehoming.

When getting into the hobby, I never thought I'd ever consider a 125. And even if I did, I certainly never would think it's occupants would be platies and mollies. Crazy how things unfold!

Thanks for the suggestions!