Platies
A livebearer that breeds without any encouragement and takes a wide range of water. Peaceful enough for a first community tank.
Photo by Julien Lepage, CC BY 4.0
Overview
Platies are small livebearers from Mexico and Belize, males to about 4 cm and females to 6 cm, and they are the usual answer to what a first tropical fish should be. They breed readily, they tolerate a wide range of ordinary tap water, and they are peaceful with everything.
The range of colours on sale is the result of decades of selective breeding rather than anything wild, and the fish underneath it is the same undemanding southern platyfish in every case.
Temperament
Busy, peaceful and social without being a strict shoal. Platies spread through a tank rather than holding formation, and they are among the least stressed fish in a mixed community.
They mature at three to four months and produce 20 to 80 young after a gestation of 24 to 30 days, so a mixed sex group grows quickly. Two or three females to each male spreads the attention out. As with all livebearers the adults eat the fry, and planting decides how many survive.
Care and grooming
Worms, crustaceans, insects and plant matter in the wild, so flake with some vegetable content and the occasional frozen food.
FishBase gives 18 to 25 degrees C, which is 64 to 77 F, and pH 7.0 to 8.0 in moderately hard water. That is a cooler range than many community fish, and a platy kept at the top of a tropical tank's temperature lives a shorter, faster life than one kept in the middle of its own range.
Living and exercise
A 60 cm tank, about 10 gallons, planted at the back and sides with open water in front. Nothing about them is demanding as long as the water is stable and the filter is doing its job.
They mix with tetras, corydoras, other livebearers and most small peaceful community fish. The one thing to plan for is the population: without a plan for the fry, a platy tank doubles and then doubles again, and the crowding is what eventually causes problems.
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