two Malawians need sexing

2553 Views 8 Replies 3 Participants Last post by cichlidaholic, Apr 20, 2008

rquy

Discussion Starter · Apr 12, 2008

Hi, the peacock was bought from a lfs about ten months ago and had quite intense orange and blue around the face, i was assured by the owner that it was a male. Except it lost it's colour and only now does it appear to be coming back, total length 4 inches.

The elongatus chalosi was given to me by a friend after his impressive male bred with some of his females, we believe them to be genuine chalosi and the male looks like most online reference. We chose this as it appeared the most male like of the juvys. but six months in my tank and i'm thinking it's a female. total fish length is 3 inches

Any help is appreciated. Thanks

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MalawiLover

· #4 · Apr 18, 2008

The first one could be a pure female peacock (though which species would be nearly impossible to tell), as I have seen egg spots remain after heavy hormoning has worn off. If the color is indeed begining to return it could still be a male. Peacock males can take a long time to come back to color after hormones wear off, if if he is in the same tank as the mbuna, might never color up. (peacocks get very stressed by the boisterous mbuna and often won't show any color, even as adults.)

I agree with Kim on the second one.

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MalawiLover

· #6 · Apr 18, 2008

cichlidaholic said:
I don't think the fish in pic # 1 is stressed, though...Look at the fins!

The fin shape and body shape just don't look pure peacock to me, it's just looking rather "full bodied" for a 4 inch peacock, and then it almost looks like there's a splash of some faint colour on the "forehead"???

Kim

Thats why I said "might". I have had the odd male peacock totally color down (yet his fins up and "happy"), but its really a long shot. The more likely would be a mix of something, though those bars are really very straight and even. Taking a closer look, the mouth seems kind of out of place for a peacock.

(PS. To the OP- very nice picture taking. It really makes a big difference if you want good answers)

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