How to sex Lents?

[Nemesis]

How do you sex crenicichla lenticulata? I just picked one up a couple days ago, and I have no idea how to sex it. I picked the smallest of the group hoping to get a female. Thanks for any help. I can get a pic later if it's possible to sex them by appearance. It's about 7.5".

 

[Lateralus]

I believe the female should have a thin white stripe in her dorsal fin, and possibly extending to the tail. If you post a pic we may be able to tell.

 

[Nemesis]

Thanks. I will get a pic up later on today.

 

[Nemesis]

Would you say female?

 

[BigPic]

Too small to tell IME. . . both males and females have the white in the dorsal as well, just subtle differences stand out to me. The best way is to vent, even females that haven't spawned are fairly obvious.

Feed that little beauty and in a few months it will be easier to tell

 

[HiImSean]

beautiful fish! i've been contemplating one, hows the temper with the milder ciclids?

 

[Nemesis]

^ Not too bad. Occasional flaring, but he/she has yet to attack anything. I plan on giving it it's own tank soon, and possibly adding another one or two. I'm sure it won't play nice once it put's on some size.

 

[Nemesis]

Here's a cool headshot I got earlier....

 

[Peanut_Power]

Geez!! It is small!!! LoL! Here are a few good dorsal shots of my female for comparison:

Here is the male:

Its pretty easy to see the differences, although there are several similarities as well. At the moment I'm leaning more towards male, but being so small it might color up and turn out to be female after all. Like Ray said, give it some time to grow.


Sean ~ Just fyi, I've kept my lents with all sorts of fish. They look FANTASTIC with Hoplarchus psittacus though!!

 

[HiImSean]

you think they'd play nice with geos and severums too im really itching for a pike again. im worried about it being a 125g...

sorry to get off topic