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Hi. Can anyone help me sexing this panaque suttonorum (suttoni) ? I only have this one photo of it yet. Its just arrived in polen from venezuela at my freiends plecoshop. I will bring it home in january.
I belive its a female , because of the lack of odontodes/whiskers

Both males and females will have long whiskers with Panaque suttonorum (and many other Panaque too). The whiskers are often trimmed off prior to shipment to prevent the fish from damaging the bags in transit.

As far as I know there are no external sexual differences for this species that have been documented.

Andy

Narwhal72 wrote:Both males and females will have long whiskers with Panaque suttonorum (and many other Panaque too). The whiskers are often trimmed off prior to shipment to prevent the fish from damaging the bags in transit.

As far as I know there are no external sexual differences for this species that have been documented.

Andy

Ahh make sence about cutting the whiskers.
so the only way to sex these are by pairing them jo? /

I don't believe these fish have ever been spawned in captivity. Until that happens it's anybody's guess as to what the differences are. People have kept them together in the same tank, but whether that indicates a M/F pair is not a good criteria. It could just as easily be two females.

Andy

Narwhal72 wrote:Both males and females will have long whiskers with Panaque suttonorum (and many other Panaque too). The whiskers are often trimmed off prior to shipment to prevent the fish from damaging the bags in transit.

As far as I know there are no external sexual differences for this species that have been documented.

Andy

you speak about whiskers ......there called odontes, it's ridicule to suggest that the odontes are cutted of for transport. Panaque's are always transported in boxes.

To me this panaque looks a female, it has small odontes and none on the pectoral fins

rob rensen wrote: To me this panaque looks a female, it has small odontes and none on the pectoral fins

I don't mean to question you, but the pectoral fins have some big ones (IMO) out near the fingers of the person holding it. I am unsure what is considered small/large in these fish for odontes, but they seem to stick out far enough for me to be considered "big/large"

they seem very small to me...maybe a clear pic of the pecs could clear it up

nvcichlids wrote:

rob rensen wrote: To me this panaque looks a female, it has small odontes and none on the pectoral fins

I don't mean to question you, but the pectoral fins have some big ones (IMO) out near the fingers of the person holding it. I am unsure what is considered small/large in these fish for odontes, but they seem to stick out far enough for me to be considered "big/large"

If you search up pictures of suttoni there are some of them that shows odontes that's up to a couple of inces on the side of the head and on top of the pectorial fins. I don't know a lot about the suttoni but are reading all day long now about it and panque generally too have enough knowledge to house this one when it comes in january

rob rensen wrote:they seem very small to me...maybe a clear pic of the pecs could clear it up

There will come more and better pictures when its delivered to me I January

It's a beautiful panaque...I'm jealous

Rob,

Sorry for my misuse of the term "whiskers" in place of odontodes. I wanted to comment specifically on the interopercular odontodes as opposed to odontodes that would be found on the leading edge of the pectoral fins or those that are found on the caudal peduncle in other species.

And it is not ridiculous that the interopercular odontodes would be trimmed off. The fish are shipped in plastic bags within styrofoam boxes (Last I checked a styrofoam box doesn't really hold water very well around the lid). I have seen this practice many times before and you can clearly see the grooves on the sides of the fish in the picture's head where the interopercular odontodes had been resting. Those grooves would not be there if there were no odontodes to go there.

I bet if you look closely at the fish in question you will see that the base of the remaining odontodes are all the same length. Easily done with a pair of shears but not something you would see in the wild.

Andy

The fish in question looks more like a Panaque cochliodon rather than Panaque suttonorum. Have a look here for some recent discussion on the difference between the species.

http://www.planetcatfish.com/forum/view ... 85#p257470

interopercular and pectoral fin spin odondotes are highly variable within a single fish. I have two 30cm true P. cochliodon which have been aquarium veterans for over a decade. Their odondotes grow out, get large and showy like a "male" and other times both types of odondotes can fall out quickly until they are all gone and then they come back again. It seemed like the odondotes fell out more and grew more slowly when I kept the tank acidic and soft water but more recently I've hardened my really soft local water and the odondotes grow out faster and don't fall out as much.

There MAY be a difference in the pattern of the pectoral odondotes but their presence or absence is absolutely not an indicator of sex.