# Male/Female?



## JoshB (Dec 17, 2006)

I was just woundering how all out you tell the difference between a MALE and a FEMALE. 

Also I have 2 yellow labs, 1 (what appears to be) some kind of pea**************** and 1 other cichlid. thay get along with the catfish I'm keeping in the tank for the time being but then i feed them flakes they love it, i bought them their floating pellets but when i put in the flakes the pellets become second hand, is this normal.....and/or healthy for the cichlids???


Flakes- Topfin, tropical flakes

Pellets- Wardley, cichlid floating pellets (medium moyen)

Thanks ~Josh~


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## Mazzy (Dec 16, 2006)

different Afs. have different physical traits that show m&f, I'm honestly not sure about the labs but someone else will definitely be able to tell ya. As for the pellets and flakes, if they like the flakes, feed 'em the flakes - no matter. Or you could try different pellets. I couldn't get my cichlids to eat Wardley pellets either. They must be nasty  But they ate other brands so I tossed the Wardley and I don't buy that brand in foods anymore. I like pellets for cichlids better cuz you can put a lot less in the tank and they can eat them virtually all up rather than like flakes where some bits inevitably stay in the gravel (although this is gonna happen somewhat with pellets too of course) and IMO it's just easier to feed a few pellets than alot of flakes. Do you have to feed both? If not, just don't give them a choice.


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## kay-bee (Dec 6, 2006)

Male and female yellow labs can be very similar in appearance and can be hard to differentiate at times. In many cases the male will have bolder black fin markings than the female. But a high quality female can have the same fin markings (and will appear more vivid than a low quality male, and if they're both in the same tank it would be easy to confuse the genders by appearance alone). If you have a group of labs, usually the most brilliant and dominant ones are males. However a low quality sub-dominant male might pass for a female. 

Pea****************s are a dimorphic group of fish, so when matured the males will be a lot more colorful than the females. 

My african cichlids consume both flakes and pellets....they seem to prefer the pellets better (I feed them new life spectrum pellets). Fish have own their preferences.


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## emc7 (Jul 23, 2005)

On the labs, look at the pectoral fins, the males are usually black.


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## Osiris (Jan 18, 2005)

To sex yellow labs, truly only way is to vent them, as they are a species pretty hard to tell, either venting or if they are holding is way to sex them.

As for the second hand stuff, what do you mean? food is food to them, the catfish will always get 2nd hand stuff.........


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