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I am thinking of getting some mollies, platies and mosquito fish and i was wondering if i added salt would affect the mosquito fish
Thanx

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I don't know much about mollies but I think you can keep them in good ole fresh water. I know for a fact that you don't need salt for platies at all, mine are always breeding and there's no salt in my tank.

There has been a long time discussion on the fact about mollies+salt. I have heard numerous times that salt isnt good for your tank, unless it is all mollies/brackish water fish. Mollies wont do as good in completely freshwater, as they would in brackish. I actually heard that mollies were used to cycle a tank-In saltwater! I am not as sure as some of the more experienced members here, but i think that the gambusia are freshwater only. They live in lakes and streams and those are freshwater. I have even seen one of the associations import them into our lake, of course that brings a problem, because we need to control the populatrion........

What im trying to say, is that a lot of fish either dont like salt, or hate it, and a common mistake some people make is that they assume that the livebearers all need salt, because the LFS is the one who tells them that mollies need salt, and that theyre livebearers.

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with my mollys i sugest unless you have all mollies and you add salt to the tank dont get mollys i dident add salt and every second day they had ick of fungus the treatment dident help i did it like 5 times so i jad to sell them before they all died that was my worst expierience with fish

33 gallon 7 neon tetras-5 platys-3 bleeding heart tetras-2 corys-1 rainbow shark-2 L83 gibby plecos

Everything I read that lists the wild locations of mollies and other livebearers always includes freshwater. In the wild they are found in freshwater throughout their lifespan as well as salt and brackish for some species. They have also been bred for so many generations in only freshwater that it seems impossible they need salt to survive. Plenty of people breed them and have them live many years each in 100% freshwater. I also was comparing 1st hand accounts of the lifespan of guppies and mollies in tanks of various salt levels and found no real difference. The salt had a very minimal if any effect on lifespan compared to the strain the fish were from, how often they were bred, and how good of condition their tank was kept in. I would say unless you get wild caught livebearers from water known to have salt or fish that were captive bred in high end brackish to full marine conditions they don't need it to be completely healthy. That doesn't mean they won't survive in salt if you ever do want to setup a brackish tank and add some livebearers but you don't have to add it.

Hi there,
Platys and Mollies do not need salt in their water.
Only wild caught fish that come from specifically brackish water environments need salt, and the chances of you buying any wild caught specimens of these fish in stores is very slim.
Commercially bred fish are freshwater born, bred, and raised, and do not need salt of any kind in their water.

They do however need Clean water with low NitrAtes and NO Ammonia or NitrItes. These are highly sensitive fish.
This is likely why platy boy had a bad experience, poor water conditions, or possibly a cycling tank, or even a response/reaction to the wrong medical treatment for the disease at hand.


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Platties and Mollies are freshwater fish and most of the ones you find in the stores have been raised in freshwater thier whole lives. They do not need the salt. As far as the mosquito fish, adding salt may not be good for it either....

If you are wanting to add the salt for breeding purposes, don't worry, the fish will breed constantly without it, the same if you added the salt.

Inky