Gender of my surprise dwarf lionfish

[346700984]

Been wanting another dwarf lionfish to go with the dwarf fuzzy I already have and have had my eye on this zebra. Came downstairs and my husband had it in a bag waiting for me to find! He just came home with it as a surprise gift! Best husband ever. Anyways, anybody know how to sex the zebra as I am only familiar with sexing the dwarf fuzzies. Thanks!

 

[lion king]

You can only best guess the sex of a zebra. As with the fuzzy they need to be close to 4.5" or more to even give a good guess. With the zebra the head will be larger and more square, so you kind of need to have a reference in this regard. Females head being smaller and more slanted on the top. The pectoral fins of the male will be longer, past the caudal peduncle, which is the area between the body and the tail. Overall the male will appear to be broader and larger. If you've seen many mature zebras you may be able to get a good guess. If that fish is say 5" the head looks a bit female as well as the body looks slender, but health and nutrition also needs to be taken into consideration when it comes to body structure. If the pectoral fins doesn't exceed the caudal peduncle then you could lean towards female. But I have to stress the fish must be going towards 5" and of proper diet and health; or you can easily consider a male, a female.

Males of the same or different species will get into it with each other. In smaller tanks this can prove deadly; I've seen injuries, injuries turn into bacterial infections and death, loss of eyes, and the lesser being stressed to not eating and death. I recommend at least a 75g if two males of different species are kept, I don't recommend 2 males of the same species and have never studied 2 males of the species even in very large tanks. Multiple caves and multiple perch sites.

 

[346700984]

Thanks. I know about the head size and the pectoral fins in comparison to the caudal paduncle, but the caudal paduncle is short on dwarves and for me it’s hard to tell with these guys. My fuzzy is a male. The new zebra lionfish is a little under 4”. I know it’s been eating live food at the store as my husband asked and we only feed live food in our predator tank. It may fatten up now that it will be in it’s forever home. Thanks for all the other info, but I already know about appropriate tank sizes and whatnot.

 

[346700984]

 

[lion king]

My current zebra is too small too tell. My last zebra was a solid 7" when he passed, I pegged him for a male. His gender was confirmed when I did a necropsy. During the 8 years of the zebra, there had been 2 different fuzzies, one male and one female. He would get into with the male fuzzy. They were in a 90g with alot of cliffs and caves. Things never got out of hand. There was also a male antennata which got into it early on, but I imagine he was the king, and the others just fell into line, so there was little angst against the antennata for the most part. I've seen enough zebras to get pretty accurate, but pics aren't as easy.

Like I said earlier, if the fish isn't approaching 5" a difinite sexing really isn't possible. From those pics if they maintain the same characteristics, it would be a good guess to be female. Before maturity many fish appear to be female.

 

[346700984]

My current zebra is too small too tell. My last zebra was a solid 7" when he passed, I pegged him for a male. His gender was confirmed when I did a necropsy. During the 8 years of the zebra, there had been 2 different fuzzies, one male and one female. He would get into with the male fuzzy. They were in a 90g with alot of cliffs and caves. Things never got out of hand. There was also a male antennata which got into it early on, but I imagine he was the king, and the others just fell into line, so there was little angst against the antennata for the most part. I've seen enough zebras to get pretty accurate, but pics aren't as easy.

Like I said earlier, if the fish isn't approaching 5" a difinite sexing really isn't possible. From those pics if they maintain the same characteristics, it would be a good guess to be female. Before maturity many fish appear to be female.

Thanks for sharing your experience with the two species! So far the two lionfish are doing great.

 

[lion king]

Thanks for sharing your experience with the two species! So far the two lionfish are doing great.

If I remember your fuzzy is also around 4". Most of the lions, even males of the same species, will be fine when they are young. The true tell is when they reach maturity. For the fuzzy and zebra 4.5" is a good average, and at 5" is when they would be considered fully mature. Since most people never keep them long enough to reach maturity, you only hear people report them as getting along, so it is vital to understand their nature when mature. This is true for most fish, tank size and maturity.

 

[346700984]

@lion king have you ever seen this behavior? The male fuzzy turned himself, especially his head, dark, almost black and puffed his mouth out big (see photos) and swam slowly beside the zebra. He even gently nudged her(?) with his head twice. He would also perch beside her with his fins open or hang upside beside her. I wonder if it’s courtship if the zebra is female? Because I read somewhere online males will turn themselves dark when courting a female. That’s if different species or juveniles for that matter would even court..

 

[lion king]

The dark color is usually displayed as aggression or defensive. As far as courtship goes it would not appear in sub adults, those 2 are more than a year to 2 until maturity. I've kept male and females together, although I am not the expert on courtship; their colors become brighter, almost fluorescent when happy with each other. The dark color is more of an angry or stressed color, I imagine the fuzzy is trying to establish dominance.