Sexing Festae

[Azedenkae]

I realize I should have posted this earlier, but bleargh.

Now, in about two hours I'll be presented with a choice of Festaes, all from the same batch, varying in size but are about 1.5-2 inches approximately.

Now, I want a female. Short of venting them (owner don't really want to pull out the fish to vent), what somewhat reliable methods of sexing are there? Yes I realize the visual methods aren't 100%, but yeah, what ways are there?

 

[1bigdovii]

Best I can think of is look for some black on the dorsal din. At that size its hard.

Sent from my SCH-I500 using MonsterAquariaNetwork App

 

[Madness]

At that size you will not be able to tell physically or by venting. You'd be better off grabbing a few and hope for the best.

I know thats not what you want to hear.

 

[Azedenkae]

Damn. XD Yeah defo not lol, not what I want to hear at all. ( Im only able to choose one, and just one. D:

Oh well, 50/50 chance it is!

 

[Madness]

Maybe you may get lucky and like Bigdovii said, look for any black markings in the dorsal.

 

[Azedenkae]

Alright, I'll keep an eye out for black dorsals. Thanks!

 

[Azedenkae]

Was way too small. XD Picked one at random. >.<

 

[HighBackRTG]

Let's hope luck was on your side. I emphasize on the luck part. I had one instance where I bought a whole group from Cichlids of the Americas. 6 in total. 2 didn't make it and the 4 remainders all turned into males. I didn't like the way their bodies ended up looking and sold them to a LFS.


Sent from my iPhone using MonsterAquariaNetwork app

 

[Azedenkae]

Oh wow, holy crap that's some bad luck. :/ Hope I don't have your luck then. XD

Well it's still tiny, turns out it's 4cm TL, not SL, so smaller than I expected. Still love it greatly, she or he, but yeah. XD Would have been great to have gotten a female.

 

[David R]

I bought 8 at that size (you're really just guessing with sex, complete stab in the dark!) and got almost all females, although I thought I had a pair and 5 males (one got put down as it had a bent spine) until I removed the pair and upset the pecking order...