Do female bristlenose have any bristles?

Do female bristlenose have any bristles?

yes they can have bristles scroll up to the top of the page theres a picture of a male and female.

when females get there bristles they only get them on there lip no higher and they are not very big.

I bought what was described as a 'breeding trio'. The two females have very short bristles on the top lip compared to the male I already had. All these fish are about the same size.

This is the female.



This is my handsome boy
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What do you think? Are these M & F? Or have I been taken in?

it has lots of bristles for a female but they are only ment to grow around the lip?

both look male to me in the photo-though could be wrong

it is hard to tell, sometimes you need to see them in action....lol... or you need to see a photo of the underneath when they are feeding on the tank side.

must admit I dont have any females with that many bristles, though must say some others might has not since a great many females with whiskers...lol....

and mentioning whiskers females with whiskers usually need a shave...lol.. or have been russian imports on steroids... just joking lo...

good luck sure some one else can help you out more....

both pretty lovely albinos too, nice and mature too

I would say both are males, can we see a head on shot,
If those bristles are not confined to the lip & are beginning to run up the nose then, Its a male...I will say that first one was a male..the second , obviously male ...
Very nice fish btw, Congrats...I hope they will make gazzillions of lovley fry for you..

Have a look at Curbys Common Bristlenose profile HERE

The bottom paragraph refers to bristle growth in males and females.

Here are 3 more pictures. The 'head on' one is the best I could get and this is the same fish as in the under body picture. The third picture is of the other similar one. They are both about 11 cms so should be fully mature I would think.

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I travelled 140 miles to get these fish and queried the bristles with the seller but he assured me they were proven breeders. I don't know what to think. They wont be going anywhere else now what ever they are. If they are indeed males I will now have 9 males!! Obviously not destined ever to breed which is a shame as they are so hard to get round here.

I would say your fish are male. With the common BN any bristles at a young age is an extremely strong indicator of being male. Most common BN females do not develop bristles but when they do, they do so at an older age. This only applies to A cf cirrhosus as there are other species of BN where young bristled females are not at all unusual.

def a male.

The females never get bristles running up the nose. and he has the body shape of a male