are these a male, female banggai

[shifty51008]

long story short I was at a fish store 3 hours away and have been looking for these fish for a while and so I picked up a couple that I think are a male and a female but just wanted to get opinions on if I am correct or not.

TIA

male?

female?

 

[LemonLemon]

very difficult to tell the sex of banggai cardinals like that.

males have a larger mouth to accommodate the brooding of eggs during spawning. However, this larger mouth is usually only evident during brooding after spawning.

What i would do i to buy 3 and let a pair naturally form, and sell or give the remaining unpaired one away.

 

[SNAKEMANVET]

I have a pair,but I can't tell the differance.I just got lucky when I decided to get a male for my female.The only way I knew it was a female because she laid eggs.I now have 18 baby bangais that are 2 months old.

 

[shifty51008]

ok thanks, I thought you were able to tell from the mouthes before they spawned. so it would be safe to later on get 1 or 2 more and see if they pair up or is their a timeline that they have to be introduced into the tank together?

 

[IFbettas]

It's really hard to tell what sex a banggai is from just looking at the jaws. You can sex them more accurately by looking right before the anal fin. Males will have two "thorns" for lack of a better word, and females will only have one. The link below has pictures of what I'm talking about.

http://www.marinebreeder.org/phpbb/viewtopic.php?f=166&t=2064

 

[shifty51008]

I looked for those thorns and couldn't find any on either of them.

 

[IFbettas]

I looked for those thorns and couldn't find any on either of them.

The pelvic fins usually cover up the "thorns" so it's easiest to see them when the fish erects its fins.

 

[Wolverine]

It's really hard to tell what sex a banggai is from just looking at the jaws. You can sex them more accurately by looking right before the anal fin. Males will have two "thorns" for lack of a better word, and females will only have one.

Even that doesn't work very well, and will tend to get you a 50:50 success rate.