So far so good on fry.No losses yet. Out of my adult females. Only the one has produced. I think these fish had been hormoned. I remember my wild swords use to poduce fry regularly. I just wound up killing them, unlike my mollies, back when I use to keep nothing but livebearers

Just awoke to a pleasant suprise this morining. After months of disappointment with my group of Blood-red Red-eyed Sailfin Swordtails (BRSS), I finally have fry. I lost one adult male and an adult female. My wife and I just pulled 80 live fry from one female. The rest have dissappointed still births or no fry after showing signs of being preg. I have a few females that have very male like traits (Asian bred), they've produced nothing - I suspect they were hormoned. I can't wait to grow these out, and see if any are sailfin. The father is the fish I'm using for my Avatar. He's my biggest fish, well muscled, I grew him out in a high current tank. He's near 5inches (He was the smallest and youngest looking fish out of my goup, but had the best fins so I gave him a tank of his own.

That was an interesting article. The same is probably true of most livebearers that have specialized fins, such as the sailfins on mollies.

I know alot of people who are hobbyist that would pay more for quality, but still the majority of shoppers are either kids with their moms, the guys who want an oscar to feed goldfish to, and people replacing fish in their "tank of death".

It took me 2 years of searching. I happened on my young adults. I'm awaiting my first set of fry. But no telling what their fertility is like.

I just sent an email to Goliad Farms. Maybe they can tell me whose been ordering their fish of late from Houston.

I wish they'd sell direct.

Melody,
I agree. Unless I'm buying several pounds of dog food I avoid buying at PETSfart ( where guppies and oscars make friends...LOL). I mainly buy from my trusted LFS. Ocassionaly, I buy online, but that can be tricky (I've been burned ALOT). It's true if people were willing to pay more for quality, the LFS would get the good stuff, but as it is most customers come in and say, "I'll take one of the cute little neon ones and 3 of the red ones...and I need one of those fish that eats poop so I don't have to clean the aquarium...and can I keep one of those parrotfish with my tetra?". Serious hobbyist (translates into crazed fish horders) comprize a very small precentage of their business. Many stores are on the verge of closing down. It's ironic that we in the US are buying fish native to our waters from a continent on the otherside of the planet.

Bobby,
thanks for the advice. I'll try finding some red brick swords (I perfer solid colored fish). I've not had as much luck with domestic swords in general as I have with mollies. Wild swords, on the other hand have done better for me in the past.

I heard from Don you are breeding red lyretail swords?

I'm guessing that molly man is Bobby Ellerman. I'll try to bug Don at Fish Gallery to order me some. I use to raise the wild sailfins. If they have naturally occuring black sailfins that would be nice. Just to set the record straight, I'm not stating Charles has bad fish. I just haven't found anyone here in Houston willing to order me some and I typically get the same excuse about quality (I'm not saying it, they are... I don't know if it's a pricing thing or what). I love the mollies I had gotten from them long ago. I would drive out to Goliad, if to pick up some fish , so long as he'd sell me some. Love doing water changes -not a problem, I use to do 80% changes daily with my Discus (I'm just going back to my once favorite of all fish- I did nothing but keep wild sails and black sails for 10+years)
By the way Don mentioned you might come back to Houston. Is this true?

Cooper,
You work alot with swords, what do you think about trying to work on a solid white albino sailfin/Hifin sword?