Molly Fish/TITLE> <meta name="description" content="Molly Fish. Offers free information on Molly Fish."> <meta name="keywords" content="Molly Fish"> <META HTTP-EQUIV="Content-Type" CONTENT="text/html; charset=windows-1251"> <LINK href="/pet-care-1.css" type=text/css rel=stylesheet> </HEAD> <BODY> <table align=center cellspacing=0 cellpadding=0 border=0 width="100%"> <tr><td bgcolor="#860000" width="100%" height=30 align=center valign=bottom> <table width="95%" align=center class=ads><tr> <td class=ads><a href="/"><img src="/img/pet-care.gif" border=0 alt="Pet Care" width=400 height=60></a></td> <td><a href="/"><img src="/img/pet-care-home.gif" border=0 alt="Pet Care"></a></td> <td width=400> <form action="http://www.google.com/cse" id="cse-search-box" target="_blank"> <div> <input type="hidden" name="cx" value="partner-pub-7485713002072046:vdafuj-asyx" /> <input type="hidden" name="ie" value="ISO-8859-1" /> <input type="text" name="q" size="20" /> <input type="submit" name="sa" value="Search" /> </div> </form> <script type="text/javascript" src="http://www.google.com/coop/cse/brand?form=cse-search-box&lang=en"></script> </td> </tr></table> </td></tr> <tr><td background="/img/pet-top.jpg" height=50 valign=bottom align=center> <table align=center valign=bottom width="100%"><tr> <td class="menubar"><a href="http://www.petcaregt.com" title="Pet Care">Home</a></td> <td class="menubar"><a href="/dogcaretips.html">Dog Care</a></td> <td class="menubar"><a href="/catcaretips.html">Cat Care</a></td> <td class="menubar"><a href="/petbirdcare.html">Bird Care</a></td> <td class="menubar"><a href="/fishcare.html">Fish Care</a></td> <td class="menubar"><a href="/reptilepets.html">Reptile Pets</a></td> </tr></table> </td></tr> <tr><td bgcolor="#FCD793" align=center> <table border=0 cellspacing=10 width="100%" align=center> <tr><td width=170 valign=top> </td><td valign=top align=left rowspan=2> <H1>Molly Fish</H1> <p> <b><IMG SRC="../../images/mollyfish.jpg" width="378" height="199" align="right">COMMON NAMES: </b>Molly (Green, Black,Albino, Liberty and others). <p> <b>SCIENTIFIC NAME:</b> Poecilia sphenops. <p> <b>SYNONYMS:</b> Numerous, the best-known onebeing Mollienesia sphenops. <b>DESIGNATION:</b> Tropical <p> <b>GEOGRAPHICAL DISTRIBUTION:</b> Texas; widelydistributed in Mexico and northern SouthAmerica. It has also been introduced intoleast one Middle Eastern country. <p> <b>SIZE:</b> There are so many naturally occurringraces and artifically developed ones that anysize given can only be an approximation -around 7 cm (2.75 in) for males and 10 cm(4 in) for females. <p> <b>WATER PREFERENCES:</b> All varieties preferhardish alkaline water containing oneteaspoonful of salt per gallon (4.5 litres),maintained between 25-28°C (77-82°F). <p> <b>DIET:</b> A wide range of dried and live foods willbe accepted but vegetable matter must form aregular part of the staple diet. <p> <b>BREEDING:</b> Heavily pregnant females arelikely to abort or give birth prematurely ifthey are moved during the last week or so ofthe gestation period which can last as long as10 weeks at the lower end of the temperaturerange but is usually only half as long. Sincethe size of mature females can vary so much,brood size is difficult to categorise. However,batches of 50 fry or more are not uncommon.<b>DESCRIPTION:</b> The pure wild form (or forms) of the Molly are hardly everavailable commercially, their place havinglong been taken over by cultivated varieties.The most basic of these, and still one of thepopular ones, is the short-finned Black Molly.Claims that this variety was developed bycrossing P. sphenops with P. formosa areunlikely to be true since the latter speciesoccurs almost exclusively only as females.Male P. formosa are, at best, rare. Anysupposed P. formosa males that I have seenhave been less than convincing. <p> It is, therefore, far more likely that theBlack Molly was developed from crossesbetween various `wild-types', with subsequentselection producing the fish with which weare now familiar. Today, numerous varietiesexist, showing a wide range of colours andfinnage, some of which do not come from pureP. sphenops stocks. <p> One relatively 'pure' P. sphenops that isstill available from time to time is the LibertyMolly, a green-based fish in which the maleshave smallish, but very colourful, dorsal fins. <br><script type="text/javascript"></script> <script type="text/javascript" src="http://pagead2.googlesyndication.com/pagead/show_ads.js"> </script> </td><td width=160 valign=top rowspan=2> <a href="/fishcare/freshwaterfishbreeds/agassizdwarfcichlid.html">Agassiz Dwarf Cichlid</a><br> <a href="/fishcare/freshwaterfishbreeds/goodeidfish.html">Goodeid Fish</a><br> <a href="/fishcare/freshwaterfishbreeds/americanflagfish.html">American Flag Fish</a><br> <a href="/fishcare/freshwaterfishbreeds/pictuscatfish.html">Pictus Catfish</a> <br> <a href="/fishcare/freshwaterfishbreeds/asianfireeel.html">Asian Fire Eel</a><br> <a 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