FishProfiles.com Message Forums

hey everybody

i have two questions

1-how do you sex similus, venestus and electric yellows

2-how can you tell what species fry are?

i ask this because two days ago i notices tiny little fish swiming in my african tank of the 8 i spoted i managed to save 3 before the others were eaten by my greedy venestus

i am new to fish keeping and had thought my fish were all males.

if it helps 3 of 4 of my similus are darker in colour (ie very little colour through them ) than the larger, more dominant brightly coloured one, and also i suspect the "mother" was one of these darker fish as she seemed for about a week to be "chewing" and not eating a great deal.

other useful information would be that i have the following fish in my tank

7 electric yellow m?f?
3 eletric blue 3m
4 ob peacock 4m
4 venestus m?f?
1 metriclima greshaki m
4 Protomelas similis 1m3?
3 clown loaches
2 chinamans cat fish

mostly i want to know how to sex the fish but info on fry identificaton and fry raising will also be much apreciated

To sex them "vent" them.
-Carefully net, them flip them over, in Malawi Moothbrooders the eggs are rather large so vent is also large. Compare it to the Anal pore, in males they are very comparable in females the vent is 2-3 times the size.
the bigger the fish the easier it is...

As for fry identification, wait til they grow.
if you can post a pic it might help.
Also try looking for pics of juvenile's of the species you keep. and compare.
and again the bigger they are the easier this will also be.

As for growning them, either leave them in the "main" tank and let nature takes it's coarse or
Get a spare 10-20g, a sponge filter. give them good, clean water, and feed them 3-4 times a day.

Good Luck

thanks for the reply i had a go at venting them its sort of hard i guess if u arent realy sure what your looking for. plus the fish are still kind of small (betwen 3 and 12cm. ) the ones i suspect are females are around 5-6cm. the fry are doing well and accepting bbs. 3 survived initaly being eaten so that not bad concidering i wasn't expecting fry. im growing them out in a fry net in my main tank (dont have the financial recource for a new tank) hope fully they are similus as there worth a bit more than the others.