Identifying Females

[Haeun]

I will be getting a 10 gallon tank today, with heater, filter and some misc stuff. $10 via craigslist, I love that site. (Heheh, bad me though. Our dorm room is cramped enough as is, but I'm going to somehow make room for the new tank. Maybe I'll just clear off my desk and make it a tank holder HEHEHE.)

So I had an idea for it.

I was thinking of dividing it into three sections: 2g, 2g and 6g.
I would put my DTCT male (who is currently in a 1 gallon tank, poor thing) into one of the 2g and maybe get another male (maybe I can finally get one of the ones I've been drooling after on Aquabid) and put 5 females in the 6gallon.
Until I get another male, I would keep the right side undivided, and give the females 8 gallons.

Ok, so my questions are...
(1) Would 6g/8g be enough room for 5 females?

(2) I remember reading this somewhere, but 5 is a right number, right? I remember reading always have more than 2, and not 4. Correct me if I'm wrong.

and lastly...

(3) How do you identify females?! How do you tell if they're crowntail females, halfmoon females (well, these I can sort of tell), or veiltails?!
I tried looking through the aquabid pictures, but some of them just looked so similar to the other tail types.

 

[lisie]

6 gallons isn't enough for 5 females, sorry. 10 gallons is the very very minimum. It's a cool idea though, you'd just need a bigger tank. However, you are right, 5 females is a good number. You never want to keep less than 4 together.

As for telling females apart, it's actually quite easy most of the time. CTs will have crowning (significant crowning on all fins, otherwise it's probably a combtail), VTs and traditional PKs will have 2 rays, but a VT's fins are longer. HMs and HMPKs will have more rays, but a HM's fins will be longer than HMPKs.

 

[jollysue]

Females have an ovipositor--a white spot on the belly. Can't miss it.