Is my new betta male or female?

857 Views 23 Replies 8 Participants Last post by Bailmint, May 23, 2014

Hannah98

Discussion Starter · May 21, 2014

Hi, I went to my LFS today to get a new betta for a 5 gallon I have set up. They had tons of bettas and there were only 4 marked as female but I wasn't interested in any of them even though I was hoping to get a female anyways, so I decided to just pick out a random, healthier looking fish.

After I let the fish free into the tank, I noticed a little white spot on the underside of its belly, I'm thinking this may be an egg spot? I'm just looking for better opinions since I really have no idea :lol:

Here's a frontal view of the "spot"

Fish Axolotl Fish Aquarium Organism

A side view of the "spot"

Fish Fish Organism Marine biology Adaptation

And a side view of the whole fish, just in case

Fish Fish Tail Organism Freshwater aquarium

Sorry the picture quality is really bad, thanks though

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Eep Crood

· #2 · May 21, 2014

Yep your right, it's an egg spot, so you have a girl:-D

Hannah98

Discussion Starter · #3 · May 21, 2014

Eep Crood said:
Yep your right, it's an egg spot, so you have a girl:-D

Yay! Thank you :-D

Eep Crood

· #4 · May 21, 2014

I love the beauty of the males' fins and the uniqueness of the females. That's why I have one of each. If I got a baby betta, I'd be happy whichever gender it turned out to be, as long as it doesn't die you can't go wrong either way. But if it did die I'd be so upset because I would live my life always wondering what gender that fish was

Hannah98

Discussion Starter · #5 · May 22, 2014

Eep Crood said:
I love the beauty of the males' fins and the uniqueness of the females. That's why I have one of each. If I got a baby betta, I'd be happy whichever gender it turned out to be, as long as it doesn't die you can't go wrong either way. But if it did die I'd be so upset because I would live my life always wondering what gender that fish was

I completely agree

lilnaugrim

· #6 · May 22, 2014

Egg spots do not denote a female, young males also have a fake egg spot which sometimes they lose as they become sexually mature but in fact many of them keep it! I'm voting a male, he just looks too masculine to be female. I also see no outline of ovaries which are the ONLY way to denote a female from a male.

Eep Crood

· #7 · May 22, 2014

I doubt it- judging from finnage it is probably a female, males typically have longer fins than females

Alphahelix

· #8 · May 22, 2014

I'm thinking male as well! I have about 10-15 of each sex and it's difficult to tell early on. Egg spots are terrible decievers

how old do you think the fish is? What lovely coloration!

Bailmint

· #9 · May 22, 2014

I'm voting male, I said that in my head when I saw the pictures. "She" doesn't even have slight ovaries. I didn't see the egg spot but I guess ya'll did. Fins vary on fish though, like Plakats, my plakat male has shorter fins than her.

Hannah98

Discussion Starter · #10 · May 22, 2014

Alphahelix said:
I'm thinking male as well! I have about 10-15 of each sex and it's difficult to tell early on. Egg spots are terrible decievers how old do you think the fish is? What lovely coloration!

I honestly have no idea how old he/she is :lol: but thank you

lilnaugrim

· #11 · May 22, 2014

Yes a PK male has short fins and can often look like females.

kevinap2

· #12 · May 22, 2014

I also vote male.

Kiara1125

· #13 · May 22, 2014 (Edited)

With how short and thin the ventrals are, added with the egg spot, I'm saying female. I know that males can have egg spots, but I've never seen this, even in pictures. I had a male that I thought was a female (bought him as a "female"), but he turned out to be a plakat. The main way I could tell was not because of the lack of ovaries - even though he was red cambodian. I could tell by the way he acted. He started getting more aggressive, started building bubblenests (tiny ones), and started getting slightly aggressive to the community fish. She looks to be a blue and red dragon scale delta tail. A gorgeous find, nonetheless.

A way to find the ovaries (since she's so dark) is to feed her a lot of bloodworms and pretty much prepare her like you're going to breed her. After she's fat and produces enough eggs to where she's loaded with them, you'll be able to see the ovaries more clearly.

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haveyouhadyourteayet

· #14 · May 22, 2014

I usually go off the size of the eye, and the length/pointyness of the anal fin, and I'm seeing a young male. Esp cause he(?)'s still got some striping close to his eye, might be his little baby camo still. How big is he?

Kiara1125

· #15 · May 22, 2014

haveyouhadyourteayet said:
I usually go off the size of the eye, and the length/pointyness of the anal fin, and I'm seeing a young male. Esp cause he(?)'s still got some striping close to his eye, might be his little baby camo still. How big is he?

The eye size varies, so that's not a good indicator to go by. Anal fins will look different depending on the type. Halfmoons will be straight, yet plakats will slant - along with veiltails.

Try to get her to flare. When she does, look at her beard. If it's small and barely comes out, then it's a female. If it comes out and is VERY prominent then it's a male.

lilnaugrim

· #16 · May 22, 2014

Although the beard isn't a fantastic way to go by either, one of my males; Hawkeye has the smallest beard I've ever seen on a male and he's quite obviously a male VT lol

Literally the only way to truly sex is the ovaries and then there are other little hints along the way. MOST of the time, boys have bigger eyes, MOST of the time males have a nice smooth topline where females are more arrow shaped. MOST of the time the fins will be longer and nice. MOST of the time males will have larger beards, MOST of the time males will have false egg spots, I have pictures of those if anyone wants to see.

Hannah98

Discussion Starter · #17 · May 23, 2014

haveyouhadyourteayet said:
I usually go off the size of the eye, and the length/pointyness of the anal fin, and I'm seeing a young male. Esp cause he(?)'s still got some striping close to his eye, might be his little baby camo still. How big is he?

(S)he is about 2 inches, I also have a male plakat and a male halfmoon (or double tail, i'm not sure since his tail hasn't completely healed yet from being at the store) and they're both a little smaller at about 1 1/2 inches from head to tail. I also noticed that they're bodies are a lot smaller and narrower looking than the new one's is.

Hannah98

Discussion Starter · #18 · May 23, 2014

Kiara1125 said:
The eye size varies, so that's not a good indicator to go by. Anal fins will look different depending on the type. Halfmoons will be straight, yet plakats will slant - along with veiltails.

Try to get her to flare. When she does, look at her beard. If it's small and barely comes out, then it's a female. If it comes out and is VERY prominent then it's a male.

I put a mirror in front of her/him and then he/she started freaking out trying to get to "the other fish," I didn't notice a beard at all really. I did try this with my males and I couldn't really get either of them to flare and they didn't seem to care as much as this one does

Kiara1125

· #19 · May 23, 2014

See? I say girl. If you have other males to go by and she's more stocky then I say girl. Only thing you can do is wait for her to grow. She's not a plakat, her fins have proved that. She looks like a SD/delta to me. If her fins don't grow and she gets fatter then it's a female.

Lil, go ahead and post the pictures so both us and the OP can compare and decide.

lilnaugrim

· #20 · May 23, 2014

I've had males that have never flared, you can't say it's a female just because it doesn't want to flare. I have two of us who can attest to my old boy Jarvis never flaring for any girl or female! I have a friend who's males got over the border and embraced rather than fought lol, you can't always tell their behavior to be specifically male or female.

I guess my pictures aren't the greatest but you can still see the fake egg spots.
Here's a wild type male PK I had

Hard to see on Ditto but it's right between his ventral fins

Not mine but someone else on the forum's PK:

Fish Fish Tail Organism Aquarium

There are a few more pictures around the forum, I just can't find them at the moment. When I do, I'll post them here.

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