How do I make my fish stop having babies!?

I had six sunburst platies in June. Between Christmas and the current date, one fish had one baby and another had six. The one that had six is pregnant again. Are these fish known for having lots of babies? Should I adjust the temperature? Can I get some sort of fish that will eat the eggs? Should I remove possible hiding places for eggs? As cute as the baby fish are, my tank is getting crowded very quickly. Just in case anyone asks, I have a twenty-gallon tank. I have a plocostomus, a red-tail shark, a beta, six adult, one half grown, and six baby platies. I don't know how to separate the males from the females. I can't tell them apart. Update! I took rueishness's advice and cleared out all available hiding spots and discovered two more fish. Eight is the final head count. Would lowering the temp. a little bit help? A cold shower maybe?

Public Comments

1. ushally the males tend to eat the babys. only if there exposed.leave your tank open with little places to hide.
2. Take out the male, of course. Yes, Platties, Mollies, Guppies and the like are like baby farms. They breed all the time. Fun tank you have though. Good luck!!
3. Seperate the males and the females that are reproducing.
4. The platy is a natural breeder, therefore, I think the only way to prevent breeding is to put it in its own tank.
5. I had the same problem just today, with my mollies...one of my platys is pregnant though. But from what I've read they're pretty much the same in terms of breeding, so here ya go! Platys give birth to live babies. Try to remove as many hiding places for the fry as you can (moss, aquarium decor, etc) - this will increase your chances of the fry being eaten by the bigger fish. Your best solution is to separate the genders. For the adult fish you can look at their fins and pretty accurately tell what sex they are (see the sources for the link). For the babies, you'll have to wait a little while as the two sexes can often look similar. Platys can continue to have babies for a few months without a male, so it may be awhile before there are no more babies being born. In the meantime, you might call a pet store or a friend and see if they want any baby fish! If you leave males and females together in your tank, you'll pretty much have a batch of fry every month. Not good if you don't have a big tank! Best bet in the future is to buy adult fish. A lot of females will already be pregnant when you buy them (unless the store gender-separates), so you're probably better off keeping only males. Hope this helps!
6. stop giving them Viagra!
7. Ok, so you HAVE to get rid of the boys. That's all that's gonna help. Here's how you tell the difference... look at the bottom fin (anal fin) on the fish. The females have one that looks like a fan when spread out. The males have a tube (gonopodium) that is used to transfer sperm to the female. They also tend to have bigger top (dorsal) fins. Hope that helps! Check out the link I posted to see a picture.
8. WOW. it is great that you care about your fish. You have very good ideas, but one idea that will make sure that there will be no babies are to have all females or all males, but since you already bought your fish that advioce isn't useful... Oh, and yes platies will breed and breed and breed. They will have tons of babies. Adjusting the temp. won't do anything. The fish that are in your tank ( including the platies ) will eat their young if they're not protected. So if you remove any possible hiding spots then they will get eaten. And for the record platies are live bearers which means they do NOT lay eggs. The mother will give birth to her young. You could also sell the babies or ask a pet store if you could make a deal with them.