Sailfin Molly (Poecilia Latipinna)
March 19, 2009 by admin
Filed under Fish Species, Freshwater, Live Bearers
The Sailfin Molly belongs to Genus Poecilia Latipinna and is usually found in Mexico, Texas and Florida, California and Virginia areas. The male usually measures up to 4 inches or 10 cm and females up to 4.7 inches or 12 cm in length, so the minimum tank length should be up to 24 inches or 60 cm.
Sailfin Mollies prefer a water temperature from 68 F to 75 F or 20 C to 24 C. Its diet includes crustaceans, plant matter, dried food and worms. The fish prefer medium, hard and slightly alkaline water. Sailfin’s are livebearers so give birth to young ones.
A Sailfin molly is elongated in shape, laterally compressed and has a very large dorsal fin. The fish is usually olive green in color sometimes tinged in yellow giving it a slightly dark appearance on back and little paler on the underparts. The fish has pearly scales that appear iridescent with dark spots.
The marks unite to appear as longitudinal stripes. The Sailfin Molly also has six to seven dark transverse bars at the rear back of the body. The male of the breed is easily distinguished from the female as the male Sailfin is usually smaller in size and much slimmer than the female, and has a gonopodium. The male also has a sail dorsal fin which is 
absent in female Sailfin Mollies. The dorsal fins in males usually develop after two years of age.
The Sailfin Molly requires a spacious aquarium to swim in with very little vegetation. It is usually advisable to keep one pair in each tank as males are more aggressive towards each other. The female generally gives birth to 20 to 80 young ones after a gestation period of 8 to 10 weeks. At the time of birth female Sailfin Mollies usually prefer to stay isolated. She should be shifted to new tank as she may also eat her young ones. The baby mollies swim freely after birth and grow relatively quicker. They do need a lot of attention as they are easily prone to diseases.
my sailfin molly has a growth under his top fin which is getting bigger its pinkish in colour hes eating ok any idea what it is please ? many thanks
To whom it may concern,
Thank you for sharing your knowledge and expertise on mollies. I have learned much valuable information from your website. I have some mollies coexisting happily with other community fish including guppies, dwarf and Mickey Mouse platys, female bettas, one dwarf frog, and one double tail male betta. They all seem to be doing fine together. I have dalmation, orange and black regular tailed mollies. Recently I purchased some lyre tail mollies. They sure are an active fish. They constantly are speedy swimmers and aggressive breeders. I now have some babies from these fish and they are so cute! I have a silver male lyre tail molly that is often chasing the female fish. He is the stud of my tank so I call him Fabio. He is sometimes chasing the other males and I assume this is his way to get them away from his girl mollies. Luckily I have more females then males so no single female molly is singled out as that would lead to unnecessary stress. For later reference, I have organized your website and other related websites that I may need later.
Sincerely,
Irene Steffen