Betta experts- is this a female!?

[sinibotia]

A friend of mine recently adopted a betta from a friend who is moving across the country. The person moving claimed the betta was a female. He was planning on trying to add it to his sorority tank- but when we got the fish yesterday we were pretty convinced that this fish is in fact a male. It's larger than most of the male bettas I've seen, and has the "gill beard" that I thought was distinct to males. Not to mention the fins make it look like a male veiltale, but I know that can be deceiving. It dwarfs the females in my buddy's sorority. The person giving us the fish claims to have seen the ovipositer but I can't find it. Is this, or could it be, a female?

 

[Rivers2k]

Nope Male. Females have short fins and two horrizontal black bars

 

[sinibotia]

Nope Male. Females have short fins and two horrizontal black bars

Never heard of the black bars thing, but I've read that some females can have long fins, so I was a little uncertain. Thanks

 

[Andy Sager]

Never heard of the black bars thing, but I've read that some females can have long fins, so I was a little uncertain. Thanks

Females can have longER fins but not LONG fins ( if that makes sense. ) like a male.
The black bars are usually seen when juveniles but tend to get hidden once the fish becomes sexually mature and colors up. (Cambodian varieties rarely show these bars either. )

One of the easiest ways to tell female bettas is after they are about 3 months old +. Look in the Anal area and you should see a white dot, almost pearl like. This is actually the first egg. Males will not have this.

So barring any remarkable new twists in Bettas, the one in the picture is a male.

Hope this helps

 

[sinibotia]

Went over to my friends place yesterday and the supposed "female" had built a bubble nest.... that settled it pretty nicely.

 

[Gillie]

Went over to my friends place yesterday and the supposed "female" had built a bubble nest.... that settled it pretty nicely.

More likely a male plakat if it built a nest, I've never heard of a female doing so. The nest is another tool used to attract a female.

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[sinibotia]

More likely a male plakat if it built a nest, I've never heard of a female doing so. The nest is another tool used to attract a female.

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Dunno if you can see the pictures but it's definitely not a plakat... or at least, I'm pretty sure it's a veiltail. It was just further confirmation that this is a male. The sad thing is, the person who gave us the fish did her entire senior project on betta fish behavior so we figured she would be able to tell the difference

 

[Gillie]

Yeah, was thinking that you were talking about a different fish lol

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[kdhiggins24]

Definitely a male.

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[Fishy Fever]

Looks like a male to me.