The Differences in Male and Female Angelfish

Angelfish are originally from Columbia, Peru and Brazil, and many people enjoy keeping angelfish as pets due to the exquisite beauty of their creative bodies and attractive colors. The dorsal shape of angelfish resembles a sideways triangle, their bodies are flat, round and marked with black stripes, and they have anal fins as well as dorsal fins. If you want to own or breed angelfish, it might help to know how to distinguish between males and females.

  1. Spawning

    • The most reliable method of distinguishing between male and female angelfish is to observe the spawning process. Females lay the eggs, and during a spawning pass, they generally leave a track of eggs at consistent intervals in an evenly spaced line. After the track of eggs is complete, the male will then follow the track in a different pass and touch each egg with his papilla to fertilize it. The male may even continue to make passes for a day or longer to ensure that the fertilization process was successful.

    Papilla

    • The sexes of angelfish can be identified by their papilla. Each angelfish has a papilla consisting of a pink-colored organ located between the anal fin and the ventral fin. Before the spawning process begins, angelfish display and protrude their papilla, and the angelfish with clearly larger papilla are females. A female's papilla is blunter than the males, and when the female becomes gravid, she possesses a large bulge in the area surrounding her papilla.

    Behavior

    • People can also distinguish between male and female angelfish by the behavior displayed by the fish. Males tend to be more aggressive and territorial than females. If a female angelfish in the tank becomes gravid and there are multiple males in the tank, the males will all develop and show their papilla to attempt to establish territory and exert dominance over the other males. In these situations, the gender that does not show their papilla are usually female.

    Size

    • Experts disagree regarding whether size can be used to indicate the sex of angelfish. Some experts contend that males grow faster and that mature males have a larger, more robust body with a more rounded crown. They believe females have a straighter and more even line extending from their lips to the base of the dorsal fin. However, other experts disagree with this theory, asserting that males and females can often be the exact same size and sometimes can share the same appearance. Thus, determining the sexes of angelfish by their size can sometimes be misleading, making the other methods of distinguishing sexes more reliable.