Fighting Borelli Dwarfs... Dwarves

[karin]

I have two little borelli dwarf cichlids that I got about 2 weeks ago through aquabid. One is about an inch nose to end of tail, the other a few centimeters longer. The seller said they were too young to sex. So I could have two males or two females or a male/female pair. They are both drab colors with some blue flecks around the mouth.

They are starting to have altercations. I watched them last night go at it. The little guy flaring his gills and then bigger guy twists until he is horizontal in the water. Then he turns away from the other, backs into him and sort of tries to back him up. Then they sort of come side to side and circle while rising in the water column. Then one, usually the bigger one swims away. There has bee some darts, some lip flaring, but neither backing down much. There also isn't much contact that I could tell. Both look good, but when they go at it they both seem to turn a yellow hue... oops. Now big guy is chasing little guy. They both seem to like the same side of the tank. Oh and tank is 60 gallon with lots of rock hiding places (tank picture in "members aquariums" under "Karin's 60"). I will add a few more rocks to the other side of the tank when I go by the beach today.

Can I tell from this behavior the sex of the two? If I do have two males is it certain that I will have to separate them? What do I look for, physical damage? Then separate? Can one go in a 29 gallon with breeding bolivian rams? I know from having the rams that there can be a good amount of fighting until they figure out they are opposite sexes too.

For background, Snowflake, on this forum, helped order these fish and had a hunch they were both males. The stocking is currently:

6 congo tetras
2 BN
4 Albino Corys
2 borelli dwarves
Pair of cacatuoides dwarves

 

[Essjay]

Two males will fight. They swim side by side and bat each other with their tails, then one will chase the other. I've also noticed that the more dominant one will do an impression of a dead fish (all clamped fins and floating on his side) till he gets close to the less dominant one, then he'll suddenly come upright and pounce. I have one surviving fry that turned out to be a male, and that's the way the adult male treated the 'baby' till I moved the 'baby'. But this is a 60 litre tank, nothing like as big as yours.
With a male/female pair, the male will flare out his fins and throat and swim in front of the female to show her what a good mate he'll make. There's none of the side by side, tail batting behaviour.

 

[karin]

The one that was doing the sideways thing is hiding more, the guy who was flaring his throat is the little guy and he is out and about more. But the guy who is hiding is defening his space more vigorously from the other cichilds too. Sounds like, even though they are young I might well have two males. I guess I'll just watch for things to escalate or for them to pick their territories before I make the decision to move one of them? Or should I move him and get it over with?

 

[Essjay]

I had to separate mine. The 'baby' was getting picked on more and more after he started turning blue, and hid most of the time. But your tank is a lot bigger than mine - they were together in a 60 litre tank. Baby's been a lot more outgoing since I put him in my community tank.
Since your tank is so big, I would have thought there would be enough room for two males. Even though my adult male chased the baby, there was no physical damage, so I would be inclined to leave them a bit longer, but have a back-up plan ready just in case.

I should stop calling the fish baby now he's fully coloured up

 

[snowflake311]

I will take the little guys. But you could put him in your other tank?