Confused

[cprize]

Hi all,

I purchased two ps. mpanga about 1 week ago, one with a mouthful, and one "male".

I stripped the female and i had noticed that the male had a tiny bulge in his throat, i checked to see, and to my suprise he had some fry in his mouth!

Im confused, this "male" is the dominant fish of my tank, it has very strong colours and it also chases the female.

Is it possible that the male has held the babies? or that the "male" is just a really masculine female

[chrisso81]

I've found my mpanga to be pretty hard to sex. I had a 'supposed display' male advertised, couldn't sell it so I put it back in with the colony, a week later and its got the biggest mouthful out of the bunch when the girls are sparring they really can match the male for colour! I doubt that your 'boy' is holding fry tho, unless he was halfway thru eating them I would have to say that you have 2 girls.

[cprize]

Looks like my boy has had 15 fry !

it has really strong and dominant colouring, it pointed me straight to a male lol.

Must be a sparring female.

Anyways, i might have to get me a real male now

[SydneyMike]

About a month ago, I had a male saulosi holding. He was definitely a male, has been for as long as I have had him

[Rol&Jas]

I agree, mpangas are very hard to sex. The females can have multiple eggspots like males and can colour up just the same.

The best way to tell the differences is by went sexing them.

Females have their own hierarchy just like males. If your male is not aggressive enough or smaller than the dominant female the female will dominate your tank, will be coloured up as a male.

I have 7 Ps. kingsizei and they are already breeding size. Looking at them I thought that most of them were males, so I went sexed them and counted 6 females and only one male. The one that I thought was the dominant male was actually a female.

Roland