gender changing swordtail

[longhorn13]

i have two swordtail juvie's that are about 7-8 months old and thought they were both females (had the fan shaped anal fin) and last week i bought a male sword to get some fry for extra food for my apistos, and now looking at one of the "females", her anal fin is starting to turn into a gonopodium and i can the the very beginning of a sword...

now my stocking is sort of messed up because i thought i had two females and then i bought the male. now it looks like i'll have two males to the one female (assuming she doesn't turn male too). hopefully they don't cause her too much stress, i don't particularly want to add another female sword...darn livebearers...

 

[emo]

I've heard they can change sex... but they are usually infertile.

Someone else might know for sure.

 

[Polardbear]

Black swordtails in particular take almost twice as long as other colors to sexually mature. They can be almost a year old before they develop. Other colors will occasionally have "late bloomers" that don't mature until several months after their siblings. They are not necessarily sterile, if they are just slow maturing they will still be able to breed and produce. The "late blooming males" are usually larger and more attractive than their siblings.

I don't personally care for your plans for the fry, but to each his own.

 

[longhorn13]

it is the largest of the three i was able to save from before, almost twice the size of the others which is about a month older.

and polardbear, it's not like i'm going to catch them and dump them in for feeders, they are in the tank with the caucatoides, so if they make it, they make it, if not, then that's just nature. what about anyone else that doesn't remove fry from community tanks...it's the same thing

 

[Polardbear]

I can't help it, I love my swordtails and go to great lengths to raise fry. I cringe when I see them eating their own babies. I understand that the vast majority of swordtail fry die or get eaten by something else and I've even used my female bettas for population control on one occasion. But I still don't like it. I'm not putting you down, you are correct, it is nature. Personally, I'm looking forward to being overrun with swordies.

 

[longhorn13]

the problem with saving them is, what am i going to do with them? i mean, i've got about 50 bristlenose pleco fry now, but i know the lfs will buy them from me, or if my caucatoides have babies, i can sell those...but with livebearers, all i can do is try to give them away if i don't have room for them

 

[skye4jc]

back to the original topic, do any of you know if platies can do the same thing?? i have a "female" that seems to "cross dress" every so often, and i still cant tell if she just likes exploring her masculine side now and again, or if its really a boy exploring his feminine side... i usually have NO problem sexing livebearers, but trust me! this one is deffinately gender confused daily... help?!? )

 

[vidiots]

I know that many of them are slow to sexually mature and until they are fully sexually mature they all appear female. I did the same thing a few months ago, and had a couple what I thought were females when I bought them turn out to be males.

 

[Jen]

I had 13 platy fry... all females for the first 9 months. Then all of a sudden 1 day the one that I thought would be a male do to colouring, was! I a 16 hour time frame went from girl to boy. Its funny, and amazing how that all happens. Can you imagine having a baby and not knowing its sex until it was 8 or nine months old and a penis suddenly appeared?

 

[manfish111]

now thats what i call a gender bender fish the fish probly dosent know whatits doing i had like 6 femal sword and 2 males and 2 of femals went to males

 

[skye4jc]

*SIGH*... gotta love 'em... shame, poor, confused things... hah!

 

[Zenn]

Swordtails can and most likely most of the time change gender, especialling if you have aload of females together for a while in a tank, one will eventually turn to a male in order to follow their nature path in order to preserve their spieces, there nothing really anyone can do about it because it is natural for fish, the only thing is, now you have two males, BAD COMBINATION! one will go for male domination over the other and constantly attack the one that submits to it and soon in time the other male will kill the other and you will be one fish down... Bewarned as well i have heard of male reverting to females, but i have never in my time of keeping swordtails seen a male revert only female into males... so once you got a female changing to a male, i am affraid it is likely you will be have a male permantly...

That my advise and hope thing turn out alright for you...

Oh yeah one more thing, you can tell the difference between a naturally born male and a reverting female into a male...

Naturally born males have the torpedo shape body, however when females turn to males their head goes slightly rounded as their body tried to accomindate the male organs and so will live out as a sort of round headed male

 

[skye4jc]

i am proud, and somewhat preturbed (doh!) , to announce the platy i thought was a girl is now Oficially.....a boy.
thank you, thank you. took him long enough to make up his gosh-dnag-fangled mind though. geeeez.

 

[longhorn13]

last april i had about 30 molly fry and was told you could sex them at about 3-4 months old so i figured i had all females (i heard water temp could affect gender of the fry)....10 months later...i just noticed two of the four that i kept are males!!