Sexing pyjama cardinals please

[Rick's Reviews]

I brought these about 3 hours ago (long story short) been away for weekend and seen a small marine shop, whilst there, it had a great selection of corals but no bounce mushrooms (this is my interest)
However I purchased 2 of these before heading home.
In the shop we could not figure out male/female, Google said jaw line, shop employee was dorsal/ tail fins, we both sat there for about 20 mins watching... No clue, so I have these two in my aquriam now, how do you identify sex please

 

[blaxsun]

First you need to identify the species... these are banggai cardinalfish, lol.

 

[Rick's Reviews]

At £26 each I think I got away lightly

 

[JasonVH]

The biggest thing is if they LIKE each other and continue to hang out closely together often.. you're good. Probably a pair.

The fin thing does not work for my pair- the male has a plainly shorter fin than the female, ha. I know because the long finned one became gravid and produced eggs twice. They "really really" like each other, wanting to be close and 'dancing' together. The dancing ramps up as the female nears egg laying.

As for the jaws, possibly it's that my two are not completely, utterly, fully grown yet(my estimate they're 1 1/2- 2 yrs old now? Got them as small/medium juveniles last summer)- there's no visible difference between the two. Both are able to and do puff out their mouths during dancing.

There's also ventral sexing- feed until their bellies are round. Then check the vents for the number of projections- iirc, 2 for male, one for female.. it's still challenging for beginners though. It was not easy for me to be confident using that method.. there were times where A seemed to have two and B, one. Other times it seemed B had two and A one?!

It seems every one agrees (mature) male banggais don't tolerate other males. Unsure what the consensus is on two females.. there seems to be some comments indicating two females that got along pretty well, some not so well. Some use this to sex by having an isolated known male and introduce unsexed banggais to him. Declaration of war= male. Declaration of love= female.

 

[Rick's Reviews]

The biggest thing is if they LIKE each other and continue to hang out closely together often.. you're good. Probably a pair.

The fin thing does not work for my pair- the male has a plainly shorter fin than the female, ha. I know because the long finned one became gravid and produced eggs twice. They "really really" like each other, wanting to be close and 'dancing' together. The dancing ramps up as the female nears egg laying.

As for the jaws, possibly it's that my two are not completely, utterly, fully grown yet(my estimate they're 1 1/2- 2 yrs old now? Got them as small/medium juveniles last summer)- there's no visible difference between the two. Both are able to and do puff out their mouths during dancing.

There's also ventral sexing- feed until their bellies are round. Then check the vents for the number of projections- iirc, 2 for male, one for female.. it's still challenging for beginners though. It was not easy for me to be confident using that method.. there were times where A seemed to have two and B, one. Other times it seemed B had two and A one?!

It seems every one agrees (mature) male banggais don't tolerate other males. Unsure what the consensus is on two females.. there seems to be some comments indicating two females that got along pretty well, some not so well. Some use this to sex by having an isolated known male and introduce unsexed banggais to him. Declaration of war= male. Declaration of love= female.

That's great information for breeding processes thank you.
I'm not looking into breeding but just to identify male/female. I searched on reef2reef.
I agree as long as these guys/girls happy then it's no problems.

Any other way to identify sex please

 

[JasonVH]

That's great information for breeding processes thank you.
I'm not looking into breeding but just to identify male/female. I searched on reef2reef.
I agree as long as these guys/girls happy then it's no problems, thanks

That's perfect. As long as they get along, you're good! The issue is if one decides not to like the other, the bullying can get real. On that note- bullying is not a good indicator of sex either. I got my pair at the same time, it seemed there were two groupings in the tank. One group had bigger fish and seemed 'older' than the other. As if they came from different breedings if that made sense.

Anyways "A" came from the 'older, bigger' group. Soon after introducing to the tank, A would often bully "B". Sometimes to the point B really had to make itself hidden completely out of A's sight. Started to think of asking the shop if I could exchange or something. However after a week, A started to let up on the bullying and by week 3, they were actively hanging out together. A is the female, ha.

 

[Rick's Reviews]

That's perfect. As long as they get along, you're good! The issue is if one decides not to like the other, the bullying can get real. On that note- bullying is not a good indicator of sex either. I got my pair at the same time, it seemed there were two groupings in the tank. One group had bigger fish and seemed 'older' than the other. As if they came from different breedings if that made sense.

Anyways "A" came from the 'older, bigger' group. Soon after introducing to the tank, A would often bully "B". Sometimes to the point B really had to make itself hidden completely out of A's sight. Started to think of asking the shop if I could exchange or something. However after a week, A started to let up on the bullying and by week 3, they were actively hanging out together. A is the female, ha.

How many did you add? I have only added 2 today since my 4 X firefish died monthly?
My aquarium has only 2 clowns and 2 chromis so I added to have swimmy fish

 

[Rick's Reviews]

I mean, you could say 'your unsure and research more' which I'm doing.
It's not turning out many results

These are general fish, surely breeders know?