young love

[RedShark]

I have had two dwarf rams in my 30g tank for the past week now and i finaly succefully identified them. I have one German blue ram and the other is a kribensis. Still not sure about the sexes of these yet. I think its too hard to tell at such a young age. Every morning i wake up i see new holes being dug into my substrate. If im not mistaken arent those signs of the ram ready to sex?
I know these are both pretty hardy fish which was why i decided to put them in with 6 tigerbarbs and 1 rainbowshark. But the real question is whether or not i have a chance of successfully sexing the two of my different species of rams. Providing that they arent both males. Is there any chance of these two rams pairing off?
Any hear or seen this before? Have any pictures of the results?
Any feedback would be great.
P.s. i think its my first post in cichlid part of town

 

[Katchan]

Sorry if I come off a bit condesending(sp?) but a begginers course in dwarfs about to be run, for more begginers info see link at bottom of post.

what you have is commonly refered to as dwarf cichlids, not dwarf rams, a ram is a type of dwarf cichlid, Mikrogeophagus Ramirezi, ram being a shortning of ramirezi, the other ram is also a member of the Mikrogeophagus family but is Mikrogeophagus Altispinosa most often known as the butterfly or bolivian ram, it borrows the ram from Mikrogeophagus Ramirezi, body shape is similar but colour and size is much different. the Mikrogeophagus Ramirezi or more often known as the (german) blue ram is a wonderful little fish but due to mass breeding is getting harder to find good strains. can sometimes be sexed by the male usually having longer forward dorsal spines usually 3 & 4 than the female, more vived colour and longer trailing edge on the dorsal. females will develop a rosey pink/red belly close to breeding. originates in south america

the kribensis or krib is otherwise known as pelvicachromis pulcher or the pruple cichlid (there are a few different types of pelvicachromis all general same body shape, similar markings/colouring) originates from western africa. they can be sexed easily, males have a wedge/arrow shaped tail visable fairly young. females have purple/red tummy near breeding and usually have "eyes" on there dorsal fins, it is extremely rare for males to have these, though quite common on their tail fins, as such this is a very good method for sexing kribs when very young.

kribs often digs holes not just while breeding, and is themost likly cuplrit for the excavation in your tank, also there is 0.00% chance of the ram and krib interbreeding, it can e hard enough to get gold and blue rams mate (in my experience, gold rams being a colour morph of blue rams) and harder still to get differet types of apistogramma to interbreed (no experience here)

by the way, welcome to the addictive world of dwarf cichlids, there are many other types but its 1.17 am here and rams and kribs are what you have


http/www.fishforums.net/index.php?showtopic=82727


hope this helps

Katchan

Edit in:
useless trivia - the kribensis gets it name from its original scientific name Pelmatochromis Kribensis, when the name was revised "kribensis" which was in common use stuck as such

other bit, the albino male my avatar is the only male krib I've seen with a dorsal eye spot.