how to sex jewel cichlids

[Kingcichlid87]

hey guys i want to buy some jewel cichlids but how do you sex them ?

 

[Taranis17]

My wife and I breed them.

The males are much bigger than the females, and more colorful.

 

[Kingcichlid87]

someone also told me that the dorsal fin on the male is pointed and the female its more round is this true ?

 

[garfy]

someone also told me that the dorsal fin on the male is pointed and the female its more round is this true ?

Nope.The best way as far as I can see is in the tail.Females will have a red tip fading to yellowish and the males red with blue speckles.
However this only seems to be apparent in young fish.Jewels are almost as difficult to sex as Oscars.Behaviour through observation is probably your best bet.

 

[biss444]

mature jewels are easy to tell the male is generally almost twice as long, its hard to tell by coloring, when they are mature, and when they are in there breeding colors they become a very bright red, i have a family of them and have been breeding, them, very easy to breed also.

 

[Kingcichlid87]

ok thanks everyone ill just buy a small group and hope for a pair as im looking to breed them .

 

[biss444]

make sure you have plenty of places , caves, rocks to breed on and in, and also for the female to hide, because the male tends to get aggressive, i had good luck with a pair in a tank with a couple others as dither fish, the male spend more time just keeping the others away instead of beating on each other, i find that longer tanks are better than the high tanks. babies are fairly easy to raise, with brineshrimp, micro worms and a dried powder called first bites.

 

[Lady_Alia]

What kind of jewels do you have?


I have hemichromis lifalili and I can tell by the pointy or rounded fins along with the size along with the tail. On the males, the tail spangles are throughout. On the female, the spangles are at the top and fade as the spread down the tail.

 

[Kingcichlid87]

ok thanks will a 3ft tank be ok to have 4 jewel cichlids in ? i have plenty of rocks and caves already

 

[biss444]

that would be perfecto

 

[biss444]

i have the same jewels that you have 'lady, there are certainly way to tell by finage, but it is fullproof with adults on the size, males are much longer, the females are much more rounded, boy when they are in breeding colors they are bright red, very beautiful fish, i actually stoped breeding these guys a while ago, but i have a dozen of them in my tank, and they are still breeding and sometimes i will get for to five babies survive to maturity, and i don't even feed the babies, the tank is well established with green hair algea growing on everything, babies are finding nurishment.

 

[Lady_Alia]

My jewels. You can see here the body difference. The colors are about the same here but during breeding he's darker, almost a purply color.

 

[biss444]

they are beautiful, never get tired of those bright colors , one fish i never bred but have really nice coloring is thejack dempsey, if i ever get time, maybe some day

 

[Kingcichlid87]

ok thanks alot for your help

 

[Kingcichlid87]

another question i know cichlids look after there young but would they eat any of them. if they have a breeding tank of there own. ?

 

[biss444]

thereis always that chance , most will tend there young and are good parents, if you find that say you have bred them three times or so and they eat them then you will need to pull the eggs out into a nursery tank,

 

[Kingcichlid87]

would they eat them once they have hatched and are swimming about ?

 

[biss444]

most of the time they are very good parents, but once in a while they will eat the eggs or babies. don't panic right away if you see the parents take them in there mouths, they will do that to clean them and to kind of round them up when they stray or if there is danger.

 

[Kingcichlid87]

ok thanks guys im buying some on friday so i will post pics friday night

 

[Lady_Alia]

ok thanks guys im buying some on friday so i will post pics friday night

Great! Can't wait to see em.