Sexing?

horge

Reefer
Any inside dirt on sexing Strawberry Dottybacks?

I have NEVER been able to visually (and in practical situations) tell male from female, and most of those fish I've had the opportunity to care for (or referee, actually :)) are sub-adults.

:(


horge
 
hi horge

Any inside dirt on sexing Strawberry Dottybacks?

of course! put 2 together and see which one lays the eggs ;)

seriously, there is no sexual dichromatism in this species. short of a pregnant female, you can't tell the difference. however, if you add 2 together the larger one will become the male, if it isn't one already. if you add two males you should figure out this mistake in short order.

dottybacks should be able to produce their first spawn in well before one year of age. how long did you have these "sub-adults?"

henry
 
Those stupid protogynous hermaphrodites... :)

I was handling large numbers (about 60 to 100 individuals at a time) for an exporter some years back, in an open raceway with gutter-screening partitions giving each scrappy little b*stard his own cubicle. They never stayed more than two weeks before pickup.

The guy claimed he could tell the females from the males, and I just never bothered to check up on it. So.. now that's one less nagging mystery to keep me up at night...


Thanks Henry
:)
 
I don't think it would be fair to add two of these fish to a reef aquarium. You have a 50% chance of having 2 fish of the same sex, virtually guarenteeing the death of one of the fish. Even if you have a male and female, there is a good chance that one will end up dead.

If you do want to try this "experiment" you should add the fish to a tank with no rock, so that you can remove one of the fish if necessary.

Cheers
James Wiseman
 
I don't think it would be fair to add two of these fish to a reef aquarium. You have a 50% chance of having 2 fish of the same sex, virtually guarenteeing the death of one of the fish. Even if you have a male and female, there is a good chance that one will end up dead.

following your next paragraph of advice, i would have to agree with this statement. however, i think your next paragraph is 100% wrong, therefore, i don't agree with this one either :)

If you do want to try this "experiment" you should add the fish to a tank with no rock, so that you can remove one of the fish if necessary.

adding 2 fish of the same species into any tank without hiding places is asking for one to be killed and i would consider this very irresponsible behavior on the hobbyists' part. there should always be hiding places available. for this particular species a selection of 5 or 6 pieces of 1/2" PVC cut into 6" legnths works perfectly. it allows for the dottybacks to hide from one another, thus reducing the stress. if one does need to be removed it is very simple to lift out one of the PVC sections while a dottyback hides within. this reduces the stress of having to net the fish and remove it from water. in the event that your dottybacks do spawn it will make collection of the eggs a cinch.

even with rock in the tank it facilitates an easy removal if need be. i'd rather lift a piece of LR out of my tank then chase the dottybacks around with a net in hand.

even now, after repeated spawnings, my P. fridmani will still chase each other. more like the male chases the female. IMO, in a tank without decoration this pair would not exist.

HTH
 
horge

i sent you an email about a week or so ago and didn't get a reply. did you get the email?
 
Well yeah. I just meant that the tank should be set up so that one of the fish is easy to remove if necessary. When I was spawning P. flavivertex, I used a PVC pipe with one end capped. That worked well.

In a tank with a good sandbed, the liverock really isn't necessary as long as there are hiding places for the fish.

Cheers
James
 
Good tip, that PVC hidey-hole thing :)


Henry, no such e-mail.
You have to send it to the hotmail.com or eudoramail.com accounts, both prefixed simply with 'horge'.

I've been getting tons of spam from all manner of sites, and I admit I must lose a fair bit of legit mail when hastily clearing the trash out :(

Did the lost e-mail concern a free dottyback for me, perhaps? :D


horge
 
Well yeah. I just meant that the tank should be set up so that one of the fish is easy to remove if necessary. In a tank with a good sandbed, the liverock really isn't necessary as long as there are hiding places for the fish.

agreed to some extent, however, i think the tank should be setup such that it mimics the natural environment as close as possible. this will add to the health of the animals and the likelihood that they will spawn. coincidently, this particular species makes our job easy in a nicely setup LR tank. even a full bown reef, IMO. if the hobbyist gives a few minutes to observe the tank it will be obvious which hole (ie piece of LR) the dottyback is using as it's den. remove the fish is as simple as removing the piece of LR. place it in a seperate tank, sump, or even a quarantined section of the main tank.

either way, you stated earlier of a 50% chance of it going wrong. male - male is problems, however male - female and female - female are not problems. i think the % is closer to a 66% chance of success, and a 33% chance of it going wrong.

HTH
 
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