Is this a xingu l27b royal pleco?

[Hieu Le Lam]

Hello everyone,

I recently purchase this little guy right here as a l27b xingu royal. But I read online that those usually have all red fins and my little guy has a bit of red to his front fin as you can see from the picture, although I am not sure. So is this fish an l27b xingu royal? The lack of red on the fins is really throwing me off and I would really appreciate a clearer answer from experts.

[Jools]

Red fins fade with age and are only very noticeable on young fish, say less than 20-15cm TL. Your fish also has the clear patch on it's dorsal fin which will change to black with spot but does point towards your fish being

Panaque cf_armbrusteri`xingu`

. There is more detail on this on that page.

Cheers,

Jools

[Hieu Le Lam]

Red fins fade with age and are only very noticeable on young fish, say less than 20-15cm TL. Your fish also has the clear patch on it's dorsal fin which will change to black with spot but does point towards your fish being

Panaque cf_armbrusteri`xingu`

. There is more detail on this on that page.

Cheers,

Jools

Hello Jools, the thing is, the fish is only around 7-8 cm and the red color has faded heavily, is barely noticeable. This has thrown me off heavily as by all my research online, he is not old enough to lose that red tin yet. Is this a case of an early bloomer or is he not an l27b at all?

[Jools]

Early bloomer I think plus I can see a little of the rusty red still on the fins. Everything else checks out so I think your ID is good.

Cheers,

Jools