My Pot Bellied Molly is a bully:(

[Giddy012]

Hi,
Is there anyone that has experience with Mollies, I have only been keeping them for about a month? I have one 10gal. with short finned Pot Bellied female mollies, I have no problem with them, the problem is in the 20gal.. In the 20gal. long I have 4 Male Pot Bellied Mollies (2 teens and 2 about 1-2 months old) 1 Male Betta, 2 Panda cory, 2 Male Dwarf Gourimas, and an Albino shark. I bought the Mollies together about 10 days ago, all the others have been in there for around a month. Everyone gets along great except for the 2 older Pot Bellied Mollies, the biggest one chases the second biggest all over the place. So I tried to put the one (that is picked on) in another tank, but that turned into an outright fight. Here's the thing I don't want to add the females in with the males (I hear Pot Bellied Mollies often die giving birth), so will this all settle down or should I take one back to the fish store, and if so which one? If I take out the one that gets picked on will the other one start to pick on someone else? Or if I take out the bully will someone else take over his bullying? Any help would be great, thanks. Stacy

[pixie_twixie]

None of mine have ever had any problems giving birth. Adding females should solve the problem

[Giddy012]

Should I just take the bully out and put him with the girls? I heard if combined then it should be a 1:2 ratio, and I don't think any of my tanks can handle having 12 Pot Bellied Mollies in them right now, no matter how cute they are.

[pixie_twixie]

How many females are in your 10 gallon, and is it just mollies in there or are there other fish? And is the male thats picking on the other just chasing him whenever he sees him, or is he nipping and biting at him? The other male could just be asserting his dominion but since you're saying bullied I'M assuming you mean theres some nipping going on. Depending on how many females are in your 10 gallon, you could add the male to that tank, but since I don't know how many females you have I can't really say what to do about the whole situation. Either way you're eventually going to have to put some females with the other males because they're probably going to start getting agressive with eachother as the other males get bigger.

[Giddy012]

I have 4 females pot bellies, 1 male betta, and a small passive alge eater, in my 10 gal. I did try putting the male pot belly in with the females, he didn't waste much time getting "frisky" with them, but then the girls starting to get nippy with each other. And yes he was very nippy with not only his kind but with some of the other fish in there, I believe he is actually the culprit for 2 deaths since I got him. So I took him back to the fish store, I thought that was the better thing to do anyways since seven fish in the 10gal. just seemed like to much. The 20gal. has calmed down and seems much more at ease now. Thanks for the help anyways.