Male or female?

[emanuel]

A few days ago I bought this Hemiancistrus subviridis. it's quite big, about 15 cm, but I can't identify if it's a Male or a female. Can anyone help me?

[bekateen]

I'm ambivalent about the vent because I've never been good with sexing plecos using that feature. But the body shape and pectoral spines (https://www.planetcatfish.com/common/im ... ge_id=9100) suggest to me that this is a female. I may be wrong.

Cheers,
Eric

[emanuel]

Thanks for the reply. Searching old threads in the forum, it seems to me that sexing these species is more difficult than other plecos.
I will observe how the fish develops in the coming months and whether it will get pectoral spines or not. Then I will post a new photo and ask again.

[sturiosoma]

I am going to say based on the vent that is a young male

Jeanne

[emanuel]

Thanks for the reply.
I was reading in this discussion viewtopic.php?t=21120&hilit=sexing+l128 how difficult it was to distinguish the sex from the genital papilla (L128 is a very similar species to L200)

I find H. subviridis incredibly beautiful. It has a gorgeous green color and also mine is proving to be a totally diurnal fish, it always stays out when the lights are on, while when they go out it goes inside its cave to sleep (all the other plecos in my tank do exactly the opposite) . This allows me to fully enjoy and I already dream of having a small group that roams the rocks in my aquarium all day long. But I can reach a maximum of 3/4 H. subviridis, then my aquarium will be full (I already have a group of L236). So it would be important to understand how I can tell males from females with certainty. Unfortunately I can't buy a group of 6-7 specimens where it would be easy to have both sexes, that's my problem.

I took this other picture, but I don't think it helps...