What Do I Do With This Bully Fish?

One of the mollies in my overstocked tank has been biting the other fish. Especially my swordtails. One is missing a ton of scales from the top of her head as a result. At first, I thought the swordtail was sick or had hole in the head. But discovered it was a result of the bully Molly. I watched it happen. Look at the poor thing.




Her behavior has caused other fish to start biting too. So I removed her from the tank and put her in a 5 gallon carrying case.

She looks so sad but I can’t put her back in the 60 gallon where she will continue to terrorize the other fish. My lfs won’t take her. I don’t know anyone else to take her.

I do have another tank with a red tail black shark. My bully Molly is small. Probably only 4 months old. She also looks pregnant. I’m afraid that she will be killed or hurt by the shark. I’ve never had other fish in with the shark, so I don’t know for sure. What do you think? If she tried to bite my shark... I don’t think it will end well for her. I’ve had my shark bite me, and she is strong, scary. and huge. She almost hurts me when she’s annoyed.

I don’t know what other options I have. I can’t purchase another tank. I have a 3rd already with other mollies, and she will just end up biting them.

I hated this fish when she was in my 60 gallon. I kept wishing she would die. Because the way she was biting the other fish was horrible and I felt so bad for the fish she was constantly attacking. No one deserves to go through that. But now that she’s all alone in this little cage, I can’t help but feel horrible for her. It’s breaking my heart.

What would you do?

Should I risk putting her in with the shark? Or is there a way I can get her to stop attacking other fish? She seemed to bite everyone. But focused on some of the larger fish primarily. Especially this one swordtail who was always minding her own business and didn’t deserve to be bit. And to make it worse, she never fought back. She just tried to swim away. So the fish would just keep biting her until I intervened. And this has been going on for weeks. You can see what has happened to her head. This bully wasn’t stopping.

Any advice please?

 

I'm not sure what to advise on the bully but luckdown is looking for livebearers so if your willing to ship she may take some.

 

I'm not sure what to advise on the bully but luckdown is looking for livebearers so if your willing to ship she may take some.

I have been looking forever to find someone to take my fish. My overcrowded tank is a major problem and not healthy for my fish. However, I think shipping them is inhumane and can’t bring myself to do it. Do you know anyone in Illinois? Or a surrounding state? I could drive them that way. I don’t care what the cost would be... it’s just the process of mailing them that I have an issue with. At this point, I would pay someone to take them. As long as they were a good home. Thank you for letting me know regardless.
What would you do with bully fish, if it was you. I’m just looking for other opinions. That’s all. Please?

 

Shipping if done properly really isn't inhumane - I've had fish shipped to me many times, never with any DOAs. But you definitely don't have to.

If she's really being that bad of a bully and you have nothing else you can do with her, you could euthanize her. Might be a good idea to cull fry too, so you're not overstocking even more.

 

Shipping if done properly really isn't inhumane - I've had fish shipped to me many times, never with any DOAs. But you definitely don't have to.

If she's really being that bad of a bully and you have nothing else you can do with her, you could euthanize her. Might be a good idea to cull fry too, so you're not overstocking even more.

I can’t kill a perfectly healthy fish. I do understand the reasoning behind it but it’s not something I could ever do. I appreciate your input though. Thank you!

 

Then it sounds like you're going to be continue to be overstocked (which can make fish ill and kill them if it gets too bad) if you can't cull fry and you can't rehome your females.

 

I know it's hard to rethink it, but for real - well packaged shipped fish sent priority overnight can work well. I just had 21 fish shipped, all in QT tanks now, and they were coloured up and eating inside of an hour.

I've never had mollys but I will say my bully ram did well with a time-out in a QT tank for a few days. Not sure it will help if the real cause of her aggression is overcrowding, though. I think the shipping would be less stressful to her life overall than risking her with a shark or leaving her in the other overstocked tank. JMO, of course!

 

Try this:

Take out the fish and put in separate cup

Do a 50-75% WC

Rearrange the decor

Reintroduce fish


It isn’t basically like adding the fish to a new tank.