# Is this A male or female JD?????



## jbru70 (Apr 19, 2009)




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## bigcatsrus (Apr 15, 2009)

There is another thread about sexing JD's.

Female's have "splotches" on their gill plates, where's males do not.


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## djoneser (Mar 20, 2008)

Hard one to say. Based on fins and marbling pattern I would have to guess Male though. Notice that the very edge of the gill plate has no color, even though there is a lot of color overall. Nice looking specimen!


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## Norse76 (Jul 20, 2008)

Looks like a male too me. The fins come to a nice sharp point by the looks of the pictures.


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## SinisterKisses (Feb 24, 2004)

Pointed fins don't determine sex. Females can have identical finnage. However, I would say male as well, based on the gill plates.


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## Toby_H (Apr 15, 2005)

It's a lot easier to distinuish the difference if you do not use the flash when you take pics... The best way to take a picture is when the room is tark and the tank lights are on... that will give you the most "natural" looking photos, which will make identification much easier...

Based on the pics we have, I'd agree male... but I would be much more confident after seeing the fish in normal lighting...


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## Norse76 (Jul 20, 2008)

SinisterKisses said:


> Pointed fins don't determine sex. Females can have identical finnage. However, I would say male as well, based on the gill plates.


Hmm always thought that the fins on males were more pointed and slightly longer, to where the females were slightly rounded at the tip, especially around the anal fin.


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## Toby_H (Apr 15, 2005)

While males often have longer or pointier fins than females, there are many cases where this does not prove true...

Long pointy fins is a trait that will be handed down, or not handed down, by genetics. Therefore if a male & female with shorter than normal fins have a male offspring... and a male & female with longer than normal fins have a female offspring... it is likely the female offspring will have longer fins than the male offspring...

Long pointy fins are also more often attributed to dominant fish... so even within a brood the most dominant female is likely to have longer and pointier fins than a subdominant male.

With Jack Dempseys the gill plates are the most consistently reliable way to sex them. By gill plate I mean the part that covers the gill opening.

Females tend to have blue splotches on the bottom of their gill plates. Males do not have splotches, while they may have a spangle or two in this area...

Pictures with flash are harder to tell as the flash will exaggerate very faint coloring...


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## MidNightCowBoy (May 7, 2007)

bigcatsrus said:


> There is another thread about sexing JD's.


I searched around for this thread but couldn't find it. Could someone point me in the right direction? Preferably with a link!


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## bigcatsrus (Apr 15, 2009)

Here is the thread

http://www.cichlid-forum.com/phpBB/view ... c&&start=0


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## mr limpet (Oct 16, 2007)

By the first and last picture I would say Female as there are plenty of spangles on and around the gill plate.But by looking at the middle pictures and the blue color on the body itself could be a male.If I had to guess I would say Female,but not 100%.To find out you need to find a male(which is identified by no spangles on his gill plate)and put him in.But be ready to remove as males,especially older ones will not get along with each other.Although your tank looks like there are plenty of hiding places if one starts chasing the other.


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## Toby_H (Apr 15, 2005)

Iâ€™m ignoring the first and last pic, as the angle does not show a nice profile of the gill plate areaâ€¦

So based on the middle 3 picturesâ€¦ From the eyeâ€¦ there is a lot of blue on the area I would call the fishâ€™s cheekâ€¦ then there is and arched blue line at the â€œback of the cheekâ€


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## mr limpet (Oct 16, 2007)

I guess you're right Toby.This to me is a tough one to determine the sex.You have been keeping JDs a lot longer than me.But I just think it is very rare to see a male JD with any spangles or blotches(other then around the eye)below the eye level from the mouth to the gill plate.


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## Toby_H (Apr 15, 2005)

I agree with you Limpet that this fish is/was a tough fall. Seeing the fish without the flash would have made me confident in my opinion much earlier. If, the spangles low on the gill plate are lighter in color and appear 'refractive' (as opposed to 'reflective') without the flash, I could very well change my mind...

Also, in my experience, as males mature their spangles seem to shift off of the gill plate, where younger/smaller males, having less room for spangles, may have spangles lower on the gill plate. Lastly, males also seem to have a â€˜paleâ€™ lower gill plate (such as this fish does) where females tend to sustain a darker tone in this area (at least consistent with the rest of her base color).

I would also like to add that this fish appears to have a shorter, rounder profile... which I often hear attributed as a female quality. So either I'm wrong about this fish being a male, or I've found yet another example of another sexing feature being inaccurate...

I will confess I've misread gill plates before... but I have never seen a male that had a very female looking gill plate nor vise versa... although I have seen every other sexing feature of Dempseys prove itself wrong in some specimen...


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## gage (Feb 7, 2007)

how big is the fish?


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## bigcatsrus (Apr 15, 2009)

I have gone through loads of articles about sexing JD's and they all say the same.

Tis is what I found

"Sexing Information: Sexing Jack Dempsey's is somewhat easy by appearance. Males are large and have more pointed anal fins. They have little or no blue on the gill plates while females have a good deal of blue pattern. The body of a female will have less color than a male."

As to people saying the fins are not a good way to determine the sex can be difficult if you don't know what your looking for.

My bf started of with with 2 JD's and they became a pair (brought 6 years ago) and have spawned 3 times (2 they ate). We now have 6 and if we were to go by the splotches on the gill plates we would have 4 males and 2 females. If we were to use the method of the fins we would still have 4 males and 2 females.

To me the fins and splotches would be both ideal ways of sexing JD's but after reading a few articles the slotches would be the best way after looking at ours for hours to distinguish any other differences, like its been mentioned before a sub dom male will be paler in the bottom half of the gill plates.


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## Toby_H (Apr 15, 2005)

bigcatsrus said:


> To me the fins and splotches would be both ideal ways of sexing JD's but after reading a few articles the slotches would be the best way after looking at ours for hours to distinguish any other differences, like its been mentioned before a sub dom male will be paler in the bottom half of the gill plates.


Dempseys have been one of my favorite fish for 20+ years... I've grown out several dozen spawns from over a dozen pairs in the last 3~4 years... I've raised most of those several dozen spawns until the fish were sexually mature and selected the best looking males and best looking females to breed further (thus was required to sex them)...

I have had many dominant females with longer fins than subdominant males...

I've had many long bodied females and shorter bodied males (it is sometimes claimed that females are more round bodied)...

I will completely agree that longer/pointier fins are "more common" in males... but it is not so common that I would trust it as a way to sex them...

It has been claimed that longer pointier fins are a way to sex Dempseys for a lot of years... and many things have been proven wrong over those years... and a lot of misinformation has continued to survive...


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## bigcatsrus (Apr 15, 2009)

I take all information but I also look at ours.

I agree that the only real way to sex JD's is when they start to spwan.

The mum JD like you say does have that longer pointed anal fin. I just thought I'd put that sexing info up as this was all articles I read had in common.


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## jbru70 (Apr 19, 2009)

This fish is about 4" long i got another pic that might help.


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## bigcatsrus (Apr 15, 2009)

I don't want to offend you but this JD looks very fat.

For what I can see to me looks male just going by the gill plates and that the lower half is pale in compassison to the top part of the body.


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## Ali1 (Apr 7, 2005)

what do you feed it?


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## jbru70 (Apr 19, 2009)

Ali1 said:


> what do you feed it?


I feed it omega one color enhancing cichlid pellets, Hikari cichlid gold pellets, and hikari frozen bloodworm. I feed him three times a day. I have to meter his food closely because it will pig down till it dies if I let it.


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## bigcatsrus (Apr 15, 2009)

Can I ask why you feed him that much 3 times a day? All good products don't get me wrong but thats just IMO too much.

Ours get fed 2-3 days apart, only reason for us doing that is to maintain the water and help waste build up.


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## jbru70 (Apr 19, 2009)

bigcatsrus said:


> Can I ask why you feed him that much 3 times a day? All good products don't get me wrong but thats just IMO too much.
> 
> Ours get fed 2-3 days apart, only reason for us doing that is to maintain the water and help waste build up.


I dont know why ..........but this fish always seems hungry. It eats all the food i give it as fast as it hits the water. So I still feed it three times a day, just in small amounts.


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## bigcatsrus (Apr 15, 2009)

Its recommended that you fed what the fish can eat in 30 seconds to a mintue anything left you take out. Cichlids will eat and eat. Try feeding twice a week and see how that goes. Water quailty will be even better.


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## Riceburner (Sep 3, 2008)

twice a week? I feed mine twice a day what they can eat in less than a min. Sometimes I'll miss one feeding. If I'm going away for a weekend, I'll feed them an extra time and leave some veggies...like lettuce in the tank just before I leave.


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## bigcatsrus (Apr 15, 2009)

I think that JD needs to have less food in for a little while as it looks overweight. Would you want to be overweight?


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## Riceburner (Sep 3, 2008)

I'd agree with big....less feeding would save $ too.

one of my males...


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## bigcatsrus (Apr 15, 2009)

If you gave a dog a whole sack of food, that dog would eat and eat and eat, and would eventually have a stomach that was so full it would kill the dog. This is why the human has to regulate the food for any animal including cichlids.

In the wild JD's don't have cichlid pellets drop on their heads 3 times a day.


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