hey , does anyone know if a black spot or area at the base of the dorsal fin of the red dragon or zz"s mean that its female? I have 4 at about 3" or 3 1/2 " or so but no sign of a kok , I tried venting them but I can't tell thanks
sexing by dorsal fin?
- Thread starter goblinriff
- Start date
I was afraid of that , I bought 4 fry when they were only about 3/8's of an inch, was told half kamfa half red dragon they look nice , 8 bucks a piece, so not to bad of a deal I hope
I have had 2 male RD with big black splotch in dorsal so this is not a good sign at all for sexing a ZZ FH. You got a 50% chance of each...
Most of the time a "female" has the black spot... You cant say black spot means female most of the time. See the difference?luohanfan;3732254; said:
beantickler;3732734; said:
You will have to excuse my grammer
anyway..
In general, it is difficult to tell the gender of a flowerhorn when it is still small. During spawning season, it is easier to differentiate male and female by looking at the vent near the anus of the fish. Below are general guidelines to distinguish male and female flowerhorns:
1) In general, in a batch of fry, males grow faster than females.
2) Males are usually larger and have a more developed nuchal hump (aka kok) on their foreheads.
3) In the earlier breeds of flowerhorns, about 80% of flowerhorns with black spots on the dorsal fin are females. However, with increasing cross-breeding, this fact does not hold true so much. In the newer breeds, the double flower lines of some flowerhorns extend to the dorsal fin, again making this method unreliable.
(you will find an RD is an older strain in which ive found 100% females had the spot on the dorsal )
4) The most reliable method is to look at the vent tube protruding from the underside of the fish, next to its anus. Males have a more narrow tube, looking almost like a V-shape. Females have a thicker tube with a U-shape opening. This part of the fish is their sex organ and it is more defined when they are mature
Hope this helps
yep , hoping my favorite of 4 turns out nice ,it was 3x bigger than any in the tank and a whole lot meaner, I will try to post a picture today
beantickler;3732724; said:
I don't necessarily agree that it's a 50% chance of either. We've all owned or seen males with black dorsal spots, but I feel like at least 85 percent of the fish with dorsal spots that I've seen are females.