Development of Wild L260 female

[Jobro]

Hey guys,

about 2 Month ago, 07.03.2016, I purchased one more L260. I wanted to get a female, but that's really always a big gamble for me.
I picked this single "female" from a mass of 20 plecos and still, I was not really sure about her sex when I purchased her. She was 7cm SL / 9cm TL.
She had quite some odonthodes on the cheeks but non on the pectorals. When I compared her odonthodes to these of the other L260 at the importeur, they all had the same odonthodal growth. It was really no use going by that. Even males with obvious male bodyshape had no or almost no odonthodes on their pecks and sometimes they lost almost all of their odonthodes on the cheeks. This criteria was a no go with newly imported wild caughts.

Comparing head shapes will only get you the most obvious males. At least I couldn't tell genders apart going by headshape on the younger/not dominant males and females.

Bodyshape was really tough as well. They had really flat bellies. But at least this one female of mine did show a little bigger waist than the others.

The last criterria I went for was the Vents. This specimen seemed to have a little bigger vent than the others.

Back in the shop, when I compared her to the others, I was not sure if she was really a female.
Back home my doubts turned into fear, when she claimed a cave on the second day after entering my growout/community tank to get into better shape. Didn't want to toss her into the L260 tank in order to keep a better eye on her future development. She was caving a lot. Sometimes fighting with other plecos over caves. Sometimes even fanning. I was pretty damn sure I got a healthy, round, male. Her cheek odonthodes seemed to have grown quite a bit as well.

[Jobro]

Today, almost 2 Month later, I caught her with her cave and took her out of the tank for another shooting.

Size did obviously not change in that shot period of time.
But her Pectoral fins are still all shaved
Cheeks grow quite a bit.

Body shape changed to even rounder. Looks promising.

When I turned her, she shook off all my doubts and fears. Look at that vent.

I think it's pretty obvious by now that she must be a girl.

[Jobro]

I think many people do have problems sexing newly imported Hypancistrus in bad conditions (just like me).

I'm going to add some more pictures.
This is a young male about the same size as the female above.
He is with me for quite some time now. But his odonthodal growth is even now only marginal. When I got him, he had no odothodes on the pecs at all.

The one in the center.

Here is a vent shot. You can see there is barely any vent to be seen.

Hypancistrus in that size can be quite a pain to be sexed.
Going by the vents is maybe the only reliable way to do this.

[Jobro]

A full adult male in breeding condition on the other hand will be quite easy to recognize.

This one is a wild dominant male. Size about 9cm SL / 11cm TL. Got him in the same batch of L260 as the smaller male in my prior post.

Now look at that body and headshape. Quite hairy. You can't see it on the picture, but the tail is actually very hairy as well.

Look at his cheeks.

And here comes his belly. It's all white. As you can see, white bellies are no indication of sex what so ever. Don't trust sources telling you about belly patterns on L260.

Please excuse him, he might have been a little scared and did some pooping right there.
But his vent is really easy to distinguish from the female vent.

Resellers might sell you a big male like this and then add some smaller males like the one from my prior post as "females" just to make you happy. So you better not trust them too much. Never do blind shopping if you want to get females. You will end up with subdominant males only, most probably.

[bekateen]

Very nice demonstration, Johannes! Now get these fish busy with spawning.

Cheers, Eric

[Jobro]

Presenting you another youngster.

This one is in no good shape at all. It is with me for quite some months. But it looks like it did not do very well in the L260 tank with those big hairy males.
I will put it into the growout tank to feed it up well for some months and will hopefully be able to retrieve it for some before/after comparisons and check out what it turned out to be.

Due to it's bad condition (yeah I know, probably my fault) this is a very good example of how a newly imported fish may look like and how hard it can to be to determine genders on them.

From above.
Size 6cm SL / 7.5cm TL

Headshape? Well, at least the head is not the widest/broadest part of its body. So no obvious male going by that.
Bodyshape? Well, not really a straight V-Shape. So no obvious male here either. But by far not round enough to be an obvious female on the other hand.
Odonthodes? It has been with me for quite some months, still only about the same amount of hair on the pectorals as the female in the first/second post. Pecs seem to be a little on the thicker side though, pointing towards a male. But lacking odonthodal growth. There can be two reasons: Maybe because of bad condition? Or maybe because it's a female? Who knows?

To be honest, I don't have a clue about it's gender by looking at the top shot right now. When I'm in doubt, I'd say it's rather a male than a female. Maybe I had just too many bad experiences and turned a little too pessimistic lately...

So let's look at the ventral shot.
To demonstrate just how much of a difference the angle/lightning/reflection can make on the vent shot, I will post 3 pictures of the same fish.

Enlarge this first shot and you will see, well not very much at all.

The second shot: Even without enlarging, you will see this fish is in bad condition. It could be by far worse and it will be back to healthy in some weeks of good feeding, but still, bad condition. Enlarge it and you are still not going to see too much of the vent.

Enlarging the third shot will give you a good view on the vent (yeah, I was lucky, only neede 3 to get it )
Still, this is a tough guess. The vent is not as large as a female vent can be. But it's also a little broader than the usual male vent is. It's somewhere in between.

And this is where you are going to have to make a guess. You can gamble and pray it will turn out a female or you can go home empty handed without that new potential female. Don't get deceived. Just because there are 30 plecos and you would expect there to be at least one female, doesn't mean that there are actual females in there. Just because this one looks a little off from the other males, doesn't make it a female.
My bet is it will turn out to be a male right now.

I will feed this one up for quite some months and will hopefully come back to you with a definite answer to its gender in a few months.

[Jobro]

Very nice demonstration, Johannes! Now get these fish busy with spawning.

Cheers, Eric

Thank you Eric,

yes I would love to get some fry from them. Hopefully the new female will get some action going on in there.

I also removed the subdominant males and youngsters from this tank and have them grow out now.
So maybe I can expect something nice to happen soon.