Am I boy or Female?

Hi, can anyone tell me if the females ever fight?
- either with the males or each other when trying to get their own spot under some driftwood?

These are around 14months old.

sorry about photo quality, light was just turned on and a bit of camera shake..

Females are not know to fight with other females or males and are usually shy or timid.
Although I have once seen a female resist a males advances to persuade her into the cave and it ended with the female winning

it seems like your pep is actually a boy and is hassling for top cave spot which is normal behaviour.

Do you know if (he) is fighting with other females or males when they try to approach his chosen cave, if they are males maybe rethink the tank size or add some more hiding spots.


Hope this helps

Thanks Crichards, '
I guess 'he' guards his cave, often just sits outside it. Others dont go down that end. Im not sure who is what yet. I had moved the cave to other end of tank from other one and the fight stopped, but I saw the two smaller ones having a tiff as to who would take position in a cave. Im hoping that it doesnt mean I have 4 boys and 1girl!!! This tank is way too small for them now, they have been in there 3months and the two 'boys' have doubled in size.

I am waiting to put in a bigger filter in the 6ft hopefully next week and then they will go in there.

If you could add some extra caves/hidey holes it may help to keep aggression down untill the 6ft tank is ready.

Actually female peps are well know for fighting if hiding places are few.

at 14 months old they are not mature and based on that pic i wouldnt want to bet one male or female.

I have written on this previously on another site, it is not that rare for females to show aggression -
I have two females right now that show aggression to most other BN, I also breed L071 peppermints and the male's in them can also show aggression

But as your question was for females I would say, that mostly you would be unlucky to get one in the ancistrus species showing too much aggression away from its cave, however it is not unknown.

I and a few other breeders on here have had to remove a female due to it's high aggressive behaviour.

My female was so aggressive it killed a male peppermint so that kind of shows how aggressive these fish can be when they want to be

Just noticed the small photo, it is a peppermint and possibly too small to say whether male or female fully at this stage, as others have pointed out the peppermint is a species that will show aggression a little more than the other more common catfish...

repost some better photo's from above and below the fish in a month or so.

kind regards..

Thanks for advice everyone.
I noticed that if you click onto the picture that it will come up bigger.

Bristles all around the face, almost 2inches long now.

I did a reorganise in the tank last night, took out a big holey rock that they rarely went on and added a smaller natural rock. Its put them in a tither and they dont want to go under the diftwood caves. They have taken postition up behind heater and filter intake. But at least they are moving around a bit more - until they spot me looking at them and then its hidey time lol
Just about to order the cannister filter, yay.

man, time flies when on this computer, so much for early night!!!

happyfish wrote:

Bristles all around the face, almost 2inches long now.

With Peppermints both males and females develop bristles along the lip but only the males will have them running from the lip upwards towards the eyes.