2 male blue rams defending eggs?

[jaguarr]

Is it possible to have 2 male rams taking care of the eggs?

I have a total of 4 german blue rams and I will refer them as follows:

A1 - no pink belly, but no long dorsal fin either (i assume is still male)
A2 - no pink belly and has long dorsal fine (i assume is male)
B - has pink belly, dorsal fin is between A1 and A2 (i assume is female)
C - will not be referred below, but seems to be male

Last night I saw A1 and B rubbing against a flat rock and on it were some eggs. 2 hours later I saw A2 has joined in and was rubbing aginst the rock too. The 3 of them were gently pushing each other but seemed to accept each other's presence.

Today however, I see A1 and A2 defending the eggs together. A1 is more aggressive, especially towards B as B always wants to swim to the eggs.

So is it possible to have 2 male rams taking care of the eggs?

 

[TCTFish]

Anything is possible when we put fish in a see through box. LOL.

I think it's possible that if the two are truly male then perhaps they both donated to the spawn.

Another possibility is that A1 could be leaning toward being female. It's not uncommon for fish to change sex and most often in a situation where there's signficantly more of one sex than the other. Generally it's female turning male, but I have heard situations of males turning female if there are prodominately males in the community.

I opt more toward the first possiblity I mentioned, but the sex change thing is possible.

 

[LindaC]

That's incredible, I've never heard of that before. This hobby never ceases to amaze me!

 

[jaguarr]

It turned out A1 is a female.

Because it was so aggressive towards B1 and to provide a calm place for the eggs to hatch, I moved B1 and C1 and all other fish to another tank. 48 hours later, I could see some black dots in the eggs, but the next time I checked on them, all the eggs were gone. There were no fry around either of the rams and they two were picking at the spot where the eggs used to be. I assume they ate all the eggs.

5 days later, while only A1 and A2 were still the only fish in the 29 gallon, I saw another batch of eggs, this is how I know A1 is a female, and this time she's showing a pink belly. The eggs were laid right on the gravel, a different spot from the first time. I figured they might be more experience now so didn't do anything. But this time they ate the eggs in one day.

I even got the baby brine shrimps to hatch. Oh well...hope some will make it next time.

Thanks for the comments though.