Sexing Hairy Puffers (tetraodon Baileyi)

[timmystood]

Heya Guys

Does anybody know of a visual way to sex Tetraodon baileyi, I would be eternally grateful.

Cheers
TIMMY TUM TIMBLES

 

[Lhutch]

no wya to sex puffers, enless you bring a blood sample to the vets

 

[dthoffsett]

Lhutch is right, according to what I could find (including the puffer forum), there is no reliable way to sex them based on appearance.

 

[timmystood]

I'm being done over by my suppliers who are bringing them in for me then! They are convinced they are a true pair (unless they've observed them in the wild). Another one of our branches has a true breeding pair (two batches of fry but no luck raising the fry) - I might travel down and see if I can notice any difference between them (because obviously they are male - female).

Cheers Guys

 

[kewskills]

My mate has a pair he got from StAlbans Maidenhead Aquatics, he reckons when they are about to mate the females belly lightens. just remember this is second hand info so dont kill me if im wrong.

 

[Fella]

If an LFS has had fertile eggs without fry then go by the typical method of sexing them - the male will have longer "cirri" on his face, that is to say the "hairy" parts of the hairy puffer are more prominent, like a bristlenose plec, on the male, and the female's are less prominent. That's what I've always been led to believe from a few different sources, if you want to confirm it though, I would go to the store where they're breeding and check it out.

no wya to sex puffers, enless you bring a blood sample to the vets

That depends entirely on the puffer species however, some you can tell very easily just from looking.

 

[DarkEntity]

Carinotetraodon Salivator and a number of other smaller Puffers including Dwarf Puffers are easily sexable.

 

[Jelly]

Hopefully I will be able to tell soon. I am the guy who bought the pair from St. Albans.

At the moment it does look like the male has more 'hair'. This still does not make it conclusive. I think we need more pairs to make that judgement.

 

[timmystood]

Hopefully I will be able to tell soon. I am the guy who bought the pair from St. Albans.

At the moment it does look like the male has more 'hair'. This still does not make it conclusive. I think we need more pairs to make that judgement.

Indeed. I also believe the male to be slighty darker in colour. The breeding pair i'm refering to must be different to the pair you have because the breeding pair are still at St. Albans (unless you got them yesterday).
I'm gonna pick mine up tommorow so finger's crossed i'll get some breeding action.

 

[Jelly]

What shop are you getting yours from?. When I bought mine they did say they were expecting someone to come down to have a look at them. I got them last weekend.

 

[DarkEntity]

Just make sure they are a true pair and not just a "pair" ie 2 fish or they will quite possibly kill each other

 

[Jelly]

They are a pair. They have spawned a couple of times in the store. They sit snug together in there cave.

 

[Jelly]

Timmy, did you get your pair?

 

[timmystood]

Picking them up soon. It's possible you did get 'the' pair from St. Albans, because we got some in at Peterborough I never went down to see them at St. Albans... have you got yours in any sort of salt level??

 

[Jelly]

When I spoke to the guy at Maidenhead he said that did have them in light brackish. I thought they were fresh only. They have breed in the store so I have aired on the side of caution and but a very small amount of salt.

As a side note to the sexing of them. I have noticed the hairier of the two also has a much squarer jaw.