Electric Yellow Labs Well-Being Concerns And Sexing Question

[timmorrison]

Hi, thank you for anyone taking the time to try and help me and these fish out

I know this is a bit of a read but i'd rather give as much info as i can as i am concerned that one of these Labs will die soon if i can't work out what is wrong.

About 2 weeks ago I got 2  Labidochromis caeruleus (Electric Labs), about 3 1/2 inches. I was told that they were male and female. They did seem to be (just by looking to my novice eye). Since then i have tried researching as much as i can and there seem to be two camps.. one that says it is easier to sex Labs! The other that it can be very hard to.  I sure fall in the second camp now!

Both together so you can compare a little.

Rather than put my images directly in here and use up a lot of bandwidth I have uploaded 5 of them to a web slideshow, click the link below here to see them if you like. I couldnt get good images really and the iphone camera is crap.

http/img51.imageshack.us/slideshow/webplayer.php?id=003chl.jpg

I also have put 3 videos on youtube which help show them. These were taken on the day that the other fish let Eggy out....(calling what i thought was the male, with the egg spot, Eggy - and the other fish i thought was female, Bully, because it is bullying the other heh.

http/www.youtube.com/user/ThePistoleer


They settled in fine to my tank which is my 4ft, 170L tank which the plan was/is to be an East African setup. I say was.. because i had to take 6 Black Widow Tetras and 2 young Firemouths from someone who was giving up their tank. So they are also in the tank along with the 2 Labs.
That is ok, there is no trouble between any of them, and they all can tolerate a higher pH and to be honest i am only very slowly raising the pH in the tank,  it is about 7.5. NO2 is 0ppm and NO3 <20ppm (i am due to do another water change tomorrow) Temp 27oC. There are lots of rocks and caves.

So at first everything seemed fine and it appeared both Labs were interacting with interest in each other, there was some what looked like courting, with them circling each other and fin waggling etc. This was always initiated by the fish which is now bullied, another reason i thought it was the male...

Now i thought the deeper and brighter yellow fish, who has one egg spot on it's anal fin and had very dark strips on it's dorsal fin and ventral fins, was the male. The other fish had much less defined black stripes, weaker colour and seemed less dominant.

After a few days i realised i had not seen what i thought was the male (lets call it eggy for the spot heh) eating.. so i was paying close attention. The other fish was eating everything and was always looking more. I know they can be greedy so i only give enough at one time.
To cut long story shorter, 2 weeks on and Eggy still is not eating... and looks very thin now.
Eggy a few times only has taken food in its mouth then spat it all out. 95% of the time it just lets food go right past it.

Ive tried, two types of good flake food, good chiclid sticks, bloodworm, lettuce and peas. I have been unable to find Spirulina or shrimp mix which are my next two plans.

So.. i thought maybe it's actually female and isnt eating due to breeding?! Unlikely. Then after about 1 week i found Eggy hiding near the surface of the water behind the filter.. and knew something was wrong.

From then, for some reason, the other Lab would chase and attack Eggy constantly, so that Eggy could not leave that couple of inches of water.. I put a big leafy fake plant there so at least it could hide in the leaves which it did and basically has not come out since, 1 week later. I mean it does occasionally, but the other Lab instantly chases it again and it goes back to hide on the top leaves.

So then im wondering if Eggy IS a male.. but the other Lab is AS WELL?! At this time the other Labs colours had intensified, now seeming to have blacker strips on dorsal and anal fins.. which i dont recall being so before heh..

Or.. Eggy is actually female??! and the other Lab we thought female is male and he is hassling her too much? I know i should have more females to males but i wanted to find out what these two definitely are first.  Heck, maybe they are both female lol.. I have even wondered if they are the same species! I've no idea anymore *chuckles*

The odd thing is.. after about 5 or 6 days of Eggy being forced to hide, i came down yesterday morning and found both Labs out swimming about and appearing to be best mates again and even doing what looked like courting....   That lasted one day and Eggy has since been chased and hiding again.

The one other thing that may or may not be relevant is that both Labs seem to occasionally make sudden jerky movements, like twitching. They also sometimes rub their sides on the rocks in darting motions. Not often.. but i know that can be an indicator of paracites, combined with Eggy not eating.. i wondered, but my feeling is that it is the sexual issues that are causing the problem? I rang the shop i got them from and they said they had been in quarantine for 3 weeks before and there had been no other reports of any problems of fish from that tank. They are a reputable shop.

So... you guys what do you think about which sex they are? I have put a few videos of them up to try and help. Unfortunately none of them flared fins. I was putting off trying to vent them as the fish is tortured enough without me trying to muddle through venting (which to be honest, from looking at info on the web i couldnt see much difference in the pics of venting )

Thanks so much for taking the time, any thoughts or advice are most welcome!

Cheers, Tim

 

[forby3]

This cichlid is omnivorous and should get a combination of veggies and proteins. [font="""]Spirulina[/font] is a great source of vegetables and can be found in flake and wafer form. Combine the spirulina with [font="""]brine shrimp[/font], bloodworms, and other prepared foods for a well balanced [font="""]diet[/font].

Sexing
The mature male will be slightly larger than the mature female. The male should have more pronounced black stripes on his pelvic, anal and dorsal fins.

Breeding
This cichlid is a mouthbrooder. The female will hatch her young in her mouth and keep them for a little over a month, approximately 28 days before releasing them.

Lifespan
Up to 10 years

Origin
The Electric Yellow Cichlid is from [font="""]Lake Malawi[/font] near Lion’s Cove.

however
there is no guaranteed way how to sex them. Some sources say that males have more black colours on fins. However, this can’t be considered to be 100% precise. until the fisn have been vented

 

[timmorrison]

however
there is no guaranteed way how to sex them. Some sources say that males have more black colours on fins. However, this can’t be considered to be 100% precise. until the fisn have been vented

Thanks forby3. The more i look at them both now they both "look" like males as far as colouring, but it is their behaviour at times which looks like courting that confuses me..

lol.. i went back again now and looked again and they both "look" female! I give up heh.

My thought is to then get 3 or 4 females in addition, hoping that in numbers the guy who is being tortured currently will be ok (but again.. i have the problem of ensuring i actually get females heh. When i got these 2 they claimed they were sure it was male and female.

I think i will also go find more rocks now and rearrange the caves etc, that will allow me to catch and try and vent them. It seems males holes are the same size, while females are both different sized holes? To put it simply heh. Cheers

 

[jbeechey]

All malawis are aggressive especially towards each other, I would try adding some more labs to see if the aggression is spread out any better.

 

[HappyGeorge]

Ok, first things first DO NOT FEED YOUR LABS BLOODWORM OR BRINE SHRIMP, high meat protein foods may be suitable for some cichlids but not Malawi Mbuna it is the main cause of Malawi bloat, also be careful buying cichlid food, as most cichlid food is aimed at South American species, often has a picture of Oscars on the tub. If it helps I have 4 breeding pairs of Mbuna including Labs in my tank and I feed a mix of Spiruluna flake, Tetra Prima and Tetra Pro vegetable, I also tie cucumber or brocolli to a rock and drop it in once a week.

Now as for the whole Lab or not lab issue it looks like you may have a similar problem to the one I had when I set up the tank I was sold a fish that looked like a Lab but is definately not, my bet for yours is that Eggy is a lab and Bully is something else, either yet to show its true colours or a dodgy hybrid. As for sexing labs I'm sure you have read the open source stuff on the net all of which leads to the conclusion that there is no real way to sex them by sight, some have egg spots, some have black on dorsal or pelvic or caudal fins but unfortunately neither egg spots or black lines make them necessarily labs or sexable.

The circling around each other is done by aggressive rivals and mating pairs so that doesn't help you much.

Looking at your video it doesn't look like your lab is holding young in her mouth (hence the not eating), although taking in small pieces and spitting out and being chased away into hiding is the behaviour I see when my red top afra first starts holding. Heres a link to my females holding, scroll to bottom of post for photos.

I think your best bet is as already stated, keep your aquascaping interesting, a good few rocks or pots, lots of caves and hiding places. If aggression is that high then keep moving stuff about, and the bully will be constantly staking out his territory and too busy to cause too much bother (maybe), not sure you should add too many more to that size tank, to be honest labs are really, really placid (for malawis) and not sure adding more unknowns into the tank is the answer, if you do decide to then do as jbeechey says and add some more labs. Typically labs are best kept in groups of 5 or more.

Hope this helps.

 

[timmorrison]

Ok, first things first DO NOT FEED YOUR LABS BLOODWORM OR BRINE SHRIMP, high meat protein foods may be suitable for some cichlids but not Malawi Mbuna it is the main cause of Malawi bloat, also be careful buying cichlid food, as most cichlid food is aimed at South American species, often has a picture of Oscars on the tub. If it helps I have 4 breeding pairs of Mbuna including Labs in my tank and I feed a mix of Spiruluna flake, Tetra Prima and Tetra Pro vegetable, I also tie cucumber or brocolli to a rock and drop it in once a week.

Now as for the whole Lab or not lab issue it looks like you may have a similar problem to the one I had when I set up the tank I was sold a fish that looked like a Lab but is definately not, my bet for yours is that Eggy is a lab and Bully is something else, either yet to show its true colours or a dodgy hybrid. As for sexing labs I'm sure you have read the open source stuff on the net all of which leads to the conclusion that there is no real way to sex them by sight, some have egg spots, some have black on dorsal or pelvic or caudal fins but unfortunately neither egg spots or black lines make them necessarily labs or sexable.

The circling around each other is done by aggressive rivals and mating pairs so that doesn't help you much.

Looking at your video it doesn't look like your lab is holding young in her mouth (hence the not eating), although taking in small pieces and spitting out and being chased away into hiding is the behaviour I see when my red top afra first starts holding. Heres a link to my females holding, scroll to bottom of post for photos.

I think your best bet is as already stated, keep your aquascaping interesting, a good few rocks or pots, lots of caves and hiding places. If aggression is that high then keep moving stuff about, and the bully will be constantly staking out his territory and too busy to cause too much bother (maybe), not sure you should add too many more to that size tank, to be honest labs are really, really placid (for malawis) and not sure adding more unknowns into the tank is the answer, if you do decide to then do as jbeechey says and add some more labs. Typically labs are best kept in groups of 5 or more.

Hope this helps.

Thanks guys and thank you very much indeed George, i really appreciate and am learning from your depth of reply.
Interesting that you think it might not even be a straight Lab.. that could explain a few things!

I was only feeding a small cube of bloodworm twice a week, as the fish shop said that is what they fed them heh. If it is better never to feed them it, then i certainly won't cheers.
re the food i do have, you are right, the sticks do have a pic of an Oscar heh. It is Tetra Doromin complete food for cichlids and other large tropical fish.
The flakes i have are Tetra Pro. I will look for the ones you mention when i go back to the shop tomorrow, and will try cucumber/broccoli.

Given there is little else i can do today I spent the last few hours re-landscaping. There are now about 10 caves and about 40 rocks, so hopefully that will help.. Will see how things go. Right now Bully is all over the whole tank and Eggy still behind the filter, so i left in the fake bushy plant as Eggy seems more comfortable lying on top of the leaves. (they are both smart and responsive to me already)

Here is a pic of the tank now



I think i will likely have to add a few more (what i hope are!) Labs, to give Eggy a chance. I agree, i won't be adding any other type of Malawi's. I had hoped, and still do, for a breeding pair or two. I was able to catch Eggy when the tank was mostly empty. I would need magnifying glass and a good light anytime i try again as to be honest i found it hard to see. However i think that the vent was a little larger than the anus, so if you think Eggy is a Lab, I will consider Eggy a female Lab, for now at least

I know the 4ft tank isnt huge but with the undergravel filtration, another internal filter and 2 air pumps currently, in terms of fish numbers for the tank getting say another 3 female labs and 1 male lab should be ok to bring them up to a group of 5?

I may be able to get a 6ft tank at some point in the future from a friend. My living room will have turned into an aquarium by then with the 3 tanks heh.

Thanks very much again, and gorgeous pics of yours! Cheers.

 

[HappyGeorge]

No problem mate.

Just looking back and if you look at my link again and the very last fish with the black fin edges and the glowing blue face, the one in my 2nd post on that topic, he was sold to me as a yellow lab, he was all yellow with a slight blueing on bottom of head similar to your Bully, and he has since morphed into what you see now.

Your aquascaping has made that tank look much more like a happy mbuna home, well done.

6 foot tank would be great, need to source some serious amount of rock for that sucker.

 

[timmorrison]

No problem mate.

Just looking back and if you look at my link again and the very last fish with the black fin edges and the glowing blue face, the one in my 2nd post on that topic, he was sold to me as a yellow lab, he was all yellow with a slight blueing on bottom of head similar to your Bully, and he has since morphed into what you see now.

Your aquascaping has made that tank look much more like a happy mbuna home, well done.

6 foot tank would be great, need to source some serious amount of rock for that sucker.

Cheers. Heh i chuckled when i looked for what you called that fish and i saw you titled that photo "unknown fish" ;P I see what you mean heh. That is bizarre that it could morph so much. It sure looks like a Yellow Lab...but it sure isnt yellow! Interesting pattern on caudal and dorsal fins. Do you think it is likely then a Lab hybrid?

Im heading to shop now to look for those foods.

I will need to research more on cichlid behaviour but.. now that you mention the courting looks like agressive behaviour as well.. im more inclined to think they are both female. If one was male i would assume he would actually be interested in sex sometime! I find it less likely that Bully is male and always chasing Eggy away so he doesnt get a chance to get his fin over That being said, i might try and get 2 other females and 1 male. In which case there would be 1 male to potentially 4 females which should work out ok from what i've read, since the males tend to be frisky wee buggers.

 

[HappyGeorge]

Good luck with getting what you want.

Labs are probably the least critical for male to female ratio, which is a good job with them being so hard to sex, and as for the breeding from my experience if the conditions are right and everyone is happy then you will get mating.
My tank isn't always peaceful and the first ones to breed were the Afra's of which at the time they started breeding were 2 males and a female, so I guess anything is possible.