Pet shop mollies tolerate salt very well and if you have water that is low in minerals they will benefit from the mineral content of the salt. The salt will also adversely affect most of the other fish that you have in the tank with them. If you have mollies in a separate tank, you can use sea salt to create a partly brackish situation for them but that is sea salt, not "aquarium salt".
Since Mollies are know for being a brakish water fish. I dont understand the problem with using sea salt since I understand it comes from the ocean by its name. When I do occasionally use salt for my mollies I use sea salt. To me sea salt seems better even cheaper and easier to get than aquariums salt. gerard
When you get shimmies with mollies the best I have heard is the sale. I believe it is the minerals. Frequnet water changes also helps. I have no problem with salt for shimmis. To often we look for the hard set rule like the human cure all for aging. It just doesnot always apply. gerard
Thanks very much for your replies. The water I am using is probably better for apistos or discus than it is for mollies that is why I am using salt. I am an old school fish keeper (30+) years. When I find that something works, I really try not to question it much.
I haven't kept mollies for a really long time and when I saw this thread I thought perhaps something had changed. Thanks again,
If you have water for apistos, you cannot easily keep mollies. My own water is quite good for mollies but I would never even consider keeping apistos, as nice as they look. I would need to dilute my water several fold to be able to keep apistos in good health. Something that any fish keeper should do is to find out the qualities of their tap water and select fish accordingly. In my own case, almost any of the typical livebearers will thrive in my water so I specialize in just exactly those fish. Other people, unfortunately some who like livebearers, have water ideally suited to angels and similar soft water fish. As much as my livebearers appeal to me, I know that type of soft water fish really will not work for me without using an RO to dilute the tap water. I avoid fish that cannot prosper in my own tap water because I really don't want to constantly fight my tap water to establish conditions for my fish. In the end, keeping fish suitable for your tap water will lead to far more success than trying to adapt your water to the fish that you like. As a livebearer fan it hurts me to say this, but you may be better off with other fish if you have great Apistogramma water.
I do understand your statement on the water. However, I have never really found that I had to "fight" to get the water I want.
When I was raising discus, angels and apistos, I kept large containers in the fishroom ( I do now as well). If I was running RO (I preferred rain water), I used 2 one for RO, and one for RO waste. The waste was used for some African cichlids I was keeping.
The purpose of doing this was to make any adjustments I wanted in those containers as opposed to the tanks. Worked out rather well.
Currently, I store and age my tapwater before using. I have a 50 gallon plastic container for the mollies.
I add 1 tablespoon per gallon of sea salt, aerate for 24 hours, and check both Ph and temp before using. While it is a bit more work I fing it quite rewarding to be able to provide a quality environment for my fish.
The setup is a bit primitive at the moment as I just moved into this house, but I hope to be able to install some automation to my water system in the near future.
That approach will work fine if you are only caring for a small number of tanks. When I get to the water change on a weekend I am looking at well over 100 gallons of water just to make a dent in my water needs.
