Ever since I got them, one of my females has swollen gills compared to the others. I can’t see gill flukes, and her behaviour is normal other than she hangs at the surface a lot, but she does get bullied so may be just hiding there, and doesn’t have laboured breathing. She has also dropped fry no problem. Does this ring alarm bells for anyone? Or is t just how she looks? She’s a very pale yellow with black patches. The other one that looks like her has slightly swollen gills as well, but doesn’t hang at surface.

What color is are the fish’s gills? Are they breathing from the surface of the water or are they just at the top of the water swimming?

Swollen gills can be a symptom of a few different problems. It can be parasites, bacterial infection, nitrogen poisoning, inefficient aeration for your tank size/ fish stock. If they are a mix, there is a small chance they are a variation of (false sailfin) molly that needs a more brackish setup. I’ve seen them have problems, as a LFS keeps them in reef tanks, and when tempering them back towards fresh, some would show the same signs. Each fish is different, so sometimes a particular fish can be overly sensitive.

As a general plan, I would suggest trying the “light cure” problems first (salt/wc/aeration), and if nothing helps then try heavier treatments. Just as a warning, not all medications work with salt or certain pH levels. A few of the actual medication treatments can be dosed at at a multiple (ie furan-2 is safe up to 4x dose aggressive problems).

Yea all my water parameters are safe, lots of surface agitation, I did put a little salt in at first but I have a lot of love plants and they wilted a bit so I didn’t continue it. And I have a snail and it made me nervous.

If you have the ability to set up a 5-10 gallon hospital tank, you could treat her there. A powerful aerator can be used in place of a filter with decent water changes.

What would I treat her with though? She doesn’t look unwell just noticeably larger gills than all the other fish

Give her a few days in a salted tank with a towel over it to keep it dark. Either she will get over it or get worse. If you can, ask around at fish places for meth blue, or “blue water”. It’s often used as a gentle general cure. I usually recommend Kordon brand, but any will help.

ok. yea i know where to get the methyelene blue. I”m tentative to do anything at the moment as she is no worse over 2 weeks and seems normal, and I’m worried moving her will stress her out. but if she shows any signs of being unwell, not eating, laboured breathing or gasping at surface or if they become discoloured or more swollen i will do this. Thanks everyone.

Hi all.  I’m new to the group and very new to keeping Molly (like 3 weeks in). I have two Male lyretails, a female gold molly,  a Male betta,  and a pygmy cory that share a tank. Everyone had been doing great together up to now. My husband and I went away for the weekend and came back to see one of the lyretails missing part of his tail. My husband thinks it was the betta,  although I have my doubts as the betta has shown no aggression to them after the first couple of days. My bet is on the other lyretail as I feel he is dominate (his tail fin is much fancier,  not sure if that means anything).

Is there anything I can do to help this guy out? He is swimming around still,  managing to get up to the surface and still fast enough to keep up with the others,  though his movements are different now (understandably). He seems untouched other than the tail and is still eating.

I know our tank is far from perfect,  as we’re still learning. Any help or advice is greatly appreciated!

It’s rare for molly to nip at each other’s fitting as males would try to mate with other one to show who boss so I would say it might be the Cory catfish. They will do it out of stress, shitty personally, don’t enough food in the tank and territorially.

Wow I never even considered the cory. That makes sense though as the cory is the newest member to the tank, and missing a feeding over the weekend may have made him hangry.

A lot of people never consider Cory catfish with them being so peaceful but this does happen time to time as it’s not really a big deal, just get some sinkable  food as like predators wafers for its and things should get better

Also if you want to make sure your fish doesn’t get infection, put them in a little cup of water and mix up a small solution of water and peroxide. (Don’t put the fish in it)

Take a Q-tip and gently tap the solution onto the part for the fins that missing before putting him back into the tank with his buddy.

thank you so much! I’ll give that a try when I get home. How often should I do that for him? Just the once? Are there any signs of infection I should watch out for,  other than lethargy or loss of appetite?

once for now and you can add some aquarium salt  (teaspoon) into the water to help relax everyone in the tank and kills any freshwater parasite within the water. Freshwater parasite can’t really handle any salt within the tank.

Btw if you wanted we can take this into messager and I can let out all of my fish knowledge

The males could have been fighting, they don’t usually hurt each other though.  Having two males and one female is not an ideal ratio (usually at least 3:1 f:m) so they may be particularly aggressive seeing their sexual tension is building and they can’t take care of themselves

The red fish at the side that betta? Correct by the looks of the fins its a male as well. Im pretty sure that the reason.