Cockatoo Apisto Gender

Olympia

So, I got three.. A male and female (easy)





Now this one, s/he is about 1.25" now, and so far everyone is saying it is a colourful female, but curious if anyone else that has experience with these has something to say.. It does have stripes on it's side that come and go, like the others, just not showing in this photo..

jaysee

looks like you got triple reds. I think the 3rd is a male.

jaysee

Once they settle in the gender of the 3rd ought to become apparent. what's your guess at this pont?

Olympia

No idea, I don't want him to settle in if he's a guy! I have a limited time to take him back.

jaysee

I'd bet money it's a male.

Olympia

Yea, I'm taking it back tomorrow. And probably picking up an extra female while I'm there.

Byron

That third is a male. Our profile explains the colouration differences, and there is a photo. You willnever see "male" colouration on a female.

One interesting trait of Apistogramma though, is that the subordinate males can take on the appearance of females. Some species do this better than others. I frankly do not know if this is as prevalent, or even occurs, in a species like this one that is so strongly dimorphic. But whatever, a female will never show the colouration of the male as the fish here.

Byron.

Olympia

I don't think the profile was clear enough honestly.. These fish are always changing colour- my female looks nothing like the one pictured, no yellow, the ladies turn yellow when they are in breeding condition and mine are still young. Sometimes she doesn't really have any markings, sometimes one stripe, sometimes two stripes, sometimes a spot (and she isn't rearing any fry), sometimes the face stripe, sometimes the ventrals are black.. it's all very confusing. Amazing how much communication is going on here.. Not to mention the fact that there are a number of colour morphs, which makes their little language more confusing.
I traded it in for another drab looking fish and this turned also to be a male today, that I have to take back tomorrow. Could tell right away from how the first male responded to it.. I now will have a male and two females, and stuck at that since there are no more females at the store. From what I've seen the stripe on the eye is the easiest way to sex, but when the female is relaxed this isn't visible, so I guess it's easiest to sex them if you stress them out a little bit. The males go pale and the females get all striped when you stress them out..
I added a leaf litter to their tank so hopefully that'll make it easier on the girls and I will start fattening them up to breed. :D

Byron

One must bear in mind that fish change colouration and patterning for many reasons. The stress of transport, inhospitable store tanks, etc obviously affect the colouration. The mood of the fish, interaction with others of the species, or other tankmates can also affect this from hour to hour. Behaviour is usually the best guide when it comes to cichlids, as you have noted.

One can't have every possible photo in the profiles, but I think the text is fairly clear; in this species, females will always be a drab brownish background. The yellow intensifies when spawning. This is as far as I know standard for all Apistogramma species in which the female has the "yellow." This is a harem species, so 2 females with the one male is fine.

jaysee

Often, when you want to get a specific sex ratio, it's best to get like 6, and over time remove fish to get it to where you want to be. Sexing young fish can be tricky. As Byron mentioned, the dominant male will be clear, and the other males can try to pass themselves off as females to avoid aggression.