Sex my Breidohri -- should be easy

[ragin_cajun]

I have 2 Breidohri, about a year now. They were 4 inches, and 2-3 inches when I got them, supposedly a male and a female. I figured I'd have a breeding pair in no time. A year later, no luck. These fish ignore each other completely, always have. I'm starting to wonder if the female is really a female because it has NO black in the dorsal fin at all. But it's always been smaller, always had much less of a hump on its head, and always had more drab colore--more gray than pink or purple.

Here's the male--unquestionably a male....


Now here are several pics of the "female". What do you think? Is this a female, or an abnormally drab, small, slow growing male?


Here's a pic of both of them, kinda more or less side by side, for comparison....


The male is almost a foot closer in this pic than the "female", but I"d say the male is at least 10 inches TL, the "female" about 7 inches TL.

 

[fug202]

I wonder if the fish in question is a subdominant male? The head profile looks male to me. Plus, it's my understanding that females have a dark patch on their dorsal fin. The breidohri I have are only about 3", but the one in the photo below clearly shows a dark dorsal spot whereas the others I have do not. I'm betting the one in the pic below is female.

 

[ragin_cajun]

Ian --

Yep, that's exactly what I'm thinking, too. My "female" has no black splotch on the dorsal fin--but I don't know how reliable that is. And the head profile, is kinda male, but not nearly as much so as my male. What's more, the head profile on the "female", is becoming more male in the last 2 months. Before Christmas let's say, the "female" had a pointy head with no male slope at all.

So my next question is--how hard is it to "vent" a fish? Is it very obvious, or is it one of those things that takes some experience to tell? Would posting pics of the vent area here get me a definitive answer? And how big do fish need to be to vent them?

Could it be these fish are just too young to spawn? How old do fish need to be to start pairing up and spawning? 2 years old? 3 months old?

 

[fug202]

I'm not sure how diagnostic the black dorsal spot is on females, but its presence/absence is clear on the fish I have, and I've read about it being present in females. Perhaps online photos of breeding pairs would help answer that. In terms of dominant/subdominant males, I'm not surprised that the smaller fish (if it is a male) doesn't have quite the pronounced hump as the other male - dominant individuals are likely to invest in that display whereas subordinates would likely prefer not to attract a larger fish's attention with false displays of dominance. However, the smaller fish can't hide its maleness completely, hence the changes in its general shape as it matures. As for venting, if you get a clear shot then someone here would likely be able to tell. I never bother with venting because I find catching fish a pain and I figure they would do better to avoid the stress of my inept attempts to catch them.

Based on the size of your fish, they are old enough to spawn. I believe Notho had breidohri spawning at smaller sizes than yours (a search for past threads might give specifics).

Ian

 

[duanes]

ragin-cajun, they both look like males to me. Both profiles are very square and masculine, no dorsal spot in either.
Here's a pair I had
male

female

 

[ragin_cajun]

Incredibly frustrating. So...if I were to order a female for my boy, how many should I get him to choose from? And what size would they need to be?


Sent from my iPhone using MonsterAquariaNetwork app

 

[duanes]

At time of spawning, my male was about 1/3 larger than the female, he was about 5".
I started with 4 breidhori in a 150gal, the pair bonded, and only the pair survived
In a perfect world, I always like to have as many cichlid females as possible, but always consider 3 females to one male reasonable.
This spreads out his aggression, and tends to distract him enough to sometimes give me a window of time to keep all 3 females alive.
With 2 females, there seems to be a 50/50 chance both females survive.
With 1 female, 50/50 she will be dead, unless using a divider.

 

[fwprawn]

Both are males.

 

[Predator07]

Help!. Is this a male or female breidohri?

 

[duanes]

Looks like a male to me, and it looks subdominant.
It may be that other more alpha cichlids in the tank may be preventing it from attaining full potential coloration..