How can I tell the gender of my Sunset Platties (fish)?

B

Blondeh :D

New member
I just got 2 sunset platties and the guy at petco said they might have babies but It's hard to tell if they are boy or girl. And I really want them to have babies so how can I tell so I don't try and breed like 2 dude fish. One is slightly bigger than the other but that might be an age thing.

Are there any other ways?
The big one is Sunny and the little one is Didi!
:D
 
A female platy will be more rounded than a male platy, provided the fish you are sexing are a little mature, the older the fish the eaiser it is to sex the fish.

The main way of sexing livebreeders is a little more reliable. Look at the bottom of the fish, just behind the pectoral fins and a little bit behind the anal opening. The anal fin in the female fans out in a triangle shape pointing downwards when she is relaxed. The male's anal fin is modified into a penis-like organ (gonopodium) which points backwards and does not fan out when he hovers in the water.

This method works for all livebreeders (platy, guppy, molly, swordtail) and not just any particular colour (though sunset mickey mouse sounds very pretty! My male is a sunset helmethead with black sides.)

The male sexual organs are some of the last things to develop and so juvenile females suddenly switching to male is quite common.
 
http://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://thesmileyfish.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/03/tropicalfish010.jpg&imgrefurl=http://thesmileyfish.com/%3Fp%3D50&h=298&w=269&sz=58&tbnid=v0QN0E0-k4JtKM:&tbnh=116&tbnw=105&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dphotos%2Bof%2Bmale%2Bplaty&hl=en&usg=__bB-YqqAOaFF5rWRiFqyW5hLvnPo=&ei=Ny9dSqaxIY7oMebota4C&sa=X&oi=image_result&resnum=1&ct=image
 
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