Male greshakei holding? wtf?

[ibr3ak]

I know this sounds totally out of the left field, especially knowing 100% that the fish is male, but while looking at my tank today I noticed that my male m. greshakei had that extruded throat that female mbuna have when they are holding eggs and he wasn't eating which is a first, because out of all the fish he is usually the first at the surface grabbing as much food as he can.

Anyone know what's up or have any experiences with that?

 

[nmrsco]

thats pretty strange. if you know for sure its male, then somethings wrong

 

[mostlycichlids]

Cichlids Mbuna in particular can change sex before they reach maturity. I would bet you have a new female.

 

[ibr3ak]

I'm not exactly sure what happened to this heshe, whether it just switched sexes or took on the coloration of a male, but the fish was definitely holding and the eggs were fertile, I stripped it, put the eggs in the tumbler and sold the fish back to my lfs, Sucks cause it was the biggest and one of the better looking fish in the tank, but what are you gonna do. The lfs is supposed to receive a new shipment tomorrow, so I'll check with them either tomorrow or saturday to see if they have anything good, will return my male kenyi who for some reason is growing REALLY slow and will pick up about 3 new juvies.

 

[kay-bee]

I doubt a gender shift occurred.

Do you have any pics of this fish when you perceived it to be a male and how it appears today?

 

[jm1212]

are you sure it is not just flaring?

 

[ibr3ak]

KB you can see recent pics of it here, this is just 3 days before I noticed it holding:
http://www.aquariacentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=156918

JM, yea I stripped him/her, there were around 15 fertile eggs inside.

 

[Coler]

I stripped it, put the eggs in the tumbler and sold the fish back to my lfs,

are you sure it is not just flaring?

^ Not if it produced eggs

I'm a guessing is a female.

 

[kay-bee]

Based on the characteristics displayed in those photos I'd say the greshakei was a female all along.

 

[ibr3ak]

Well yeah it's pretty apparent now, it was holding eggs

The photos (maybe because of the flash), display really dull colors, but even so looking at the females who are really dark brown and have no blue on them whatsoever is what made me question it, if I was to take a good picture, this is what it looked like (the pic is not mine):