Can any one show me with pictures or describe what the male and female vents look like on angel fish please?
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I'm not sure venting Angelfish is a practical means to sex them. IMO, You are better off waiting for the tubes to be exposed.
There are however, some external signs that may help you sex them pre spawning age. It has to do with the position of the anal fin in regards to the anus.
If you go to my bio page and look at my albums and go to "New Angels", there is a picture of a spawning pair of Silver Angels. In this picture, you will see the female on the bottom and the male above. You'll see the differences between their two breeding tubes as well as the location of the Anal fin. With females, their anal fin starts further back from the anus while a male's fin will start almost at the anus. While this is not a fool proof method with today's fish, it was remarkably accurate on the wild fish I used to breed back in the 1960s. With today's fish, so many traits that used to be gender specific have been interbred in the opposite sex. I' ve seen females with Head humps, Males that don't have the correct angle to their anal fin, Males that don;t have the head hump at all ( meanwhile the wild fish didn't have this head hump.) to name a few. But if you can find 2 fish with these characteristics, the odds go way up in your favor.
Another pretty accurate method is to just watch the fish. More often than not, when the fish are about 6-8 months old, you will see males usually guarding a smaller female from the rest of the Angels in the tank. Once you see this behavior for consecutive days, you can be pretty sure that you have a pair.
Feel free to contact me if you have any more questions and you can check out the thread " Wigglers at last!!!!" which is an ongoing thread by professionals and fellow hobbyists all about breeding Angelfish.
Hope this helps
