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Retirement and forum shutdown (17 Jan 2022)

Hi,

John Howell who has managed the forum for years is getting on and wishes to retire from the role of managing it.
Over the years, he has managed the forum through good days and bad days and he has always been fair.
He has managed to bring his passion for fish keeping to the forum and keep it going for so long.

I wish to thank John for his hard work in keeping the forum going.

With John wishing to "retire" from the role of managing the forum and the forum receiving very little traffic, I think we must agree that forum has come to a natural conclusion and it's time to put it to rest.

I am proposing that the forum be made read-only from March 2022 onwards and that no new users or content be created. The website is still registered for several more years, so the content will still be accessible but no new topics or replies will be allowed.

If there is interest from the ITFS or other fish keeping clubs, we may redirect traffic to them or to a Facebook group but will not actively manage it.

I'd like to thank everyone over the years who helped with forum, posted a reply, started a new topic, ask a question and helped a newbie in fish keeping. And thank you to the sponsors who helped us along the away. Hopefully it made the hobby stronger.

I'd especially like to thank John Howell and Valerie Rousseau for all of their contributions, without them the forum would have never been has successful.

Thank you
Darragh Sherwin

Platty's or Mollies, any real difference?

  • Sarah (Sarah)
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29 Jan 2007 11:04 #1 by Sarah (Sarah)
Platty's or Mollies, any real difference? was created by Sarah (Sarah)
I have had a look around some sites but cant really decide.

I want to get some livebearers in, and as much as I love Guppies, I would prefere a larger kind this time, and thought some of the pure black ones would be quite nice. Problem is I cant seem to decided between mollies or platys.

As far as I know, mollies are larger than platys, and platys are more compactly built, but is there any major difference in how they need to be kept, or their behaviour?

I have kept Guppies before, which were fantastic, as they would peck at algae, and bred happily in my little jewel 60 ( v heavily planted, the elodea was trailing along the surface) which was fantastic, and they were very friendly with all the other fish, from what I have heard, platys and mollies are similar, but I just wanted to make sure :O

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29 Jan 2007 13:35 #2 by essjay (S Jackson)
What about Swordtails? Always thought they were nice looking fish.

www.fishprofiles.com/files/profiles/559.htm

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29 Jan 2007 13:43 #3 by Sarah (Sarah)
Replied by Sarah (Sarah) on topic Re: Platty's or Mollies, any real difference?
Yes they are very nice :D I think there was another kind too, had long beaks, cant remember the name :(

Problem is I am after pure black fish, and have never seen black swordtails, although that could just be bad luck on my part :)

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29 Jan 2007 13:48 #4 by apistodiscus (apistodiscus)
Replied by apistodiscus (apistodiscus) on topic Re: Platty's or Mollies, any real difference?
Black mollies require very hard water if possible with a little salt added. Contrary to common believe they actually require quiet high temperatures as well. 28 degrees seems to be the optimum temperature. Not the ideal conditions for plants.

I have also seen them kept in pure salt water. Seems to be no problem for them once you slowly get them used to it..

Is there such as thing as completely balck platies? Are you sure you are not mistaking them for female black swordtails?

Holger

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29 Jan 2007 14:53 #5 by Sarah (Sarah)
Replied by Sarah (Sarah) on topic Re: Platty's or Mollies, any real difference?
No, I dont think there are black platys, they tend to be speckled, but I havent seen pure black ones sadly, which leaves me with Mollies.

Your right about the salt water, seems they can handle both salt and fresh, which is rather impressive. Only problem I have with the Mollys at all is that they seem to be a lot bigger then any of my other fish, I know they arent what you would call aggressive, but I hope they will not spook them :S

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30 Jan 2007 02:45 #6 by apistodiscus (apistodiscus)
Replied by apistodiscus (apistodiscus) on topic Re: Platty's or Mollies, any real difference?
Hi Sarah,
you shoul not have any problems with black mollies as regards agression. they don't grow that big either.
Holger

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03 Feb 2007 18:28 #7 by Sarah (Sarah)
Replied by Sarah (Sarah) on topic Re: Platty's or Mollies, any real difference?
Well I ended up getting 4 black mollies and 4 mickey mouse platties after all, settled in immediately, and cleared my tank of all unwanted algae /cheer.

Also now have 8 B.molly and 7 platty fry swimming around. Last time I had livebearer fry were my guppies, and I needed an extremly heavily planted tank to save em from the parents, but these parents cant seem to be arsed, and neither can any of the other fish o.O The fry are all swimming around the bottom, eating bits of of algae they find in plant roots and picking food out of the sand, and none of the other fish are even attempting to chase them, its crazy. I may end up with a few survivors without even having to interfere Hehe!

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