A Question To Severum Behavior Experts

Ok I have two red spotted severums which I know are very difficult to sex. Both are 9months old around 6”. Lives separately (for no particular reason, I just put them in two different tanks and the plan is to only keep one).

Now one of the red spotted severums, the one who is with my 8” Rotkeil Severum has been doing the “shivering dance” move for a while. No not flashing or rubbing on the decor or substrate. Just some kind of shivery swing move hahaha

Few weeks ago it had lip locked and pushed my supposedly male Rotkeil (Mr. Hitchcock) around despite Rotkeil being at least 2” bigger. I thought it was territorial fight. But later saw them both resting in the same flowepot base making me further confused. Oh it has swollen lips for few hours after that encounter. Now this morning they are still swimming together. Everywhere Mr Hitchcock goes the red spotted Severum follow albeit still keeping 10” of space. Nothing like body to body in the case of my other couples.


Thus before and after the liplock incident they kind of stayed and swam near to each other most of the time. Also there was no gill flaring during liplock.

There are couple of female convicts also in that tank. But no on the seem to be swimming with both of them.

Now that red spotted does this vibrating shivers quite often I understand it is in heat. But with what? Is it a female? Oh lip locking was over a flowerpot base which both of them hang out by. But I have not seen them behaving like couple like my other fishes(Read Blood parrots,Convicts, Rams and Flowerhorns) do.

Are they a couple? Should I move both to my33.7G breeding cube and see what happens?

 

that is a sign that breeding is going to happen and yes I would move them to your 33.7g breeding cube

 

Which could be the male then? I always thought both were males. The one that shivers is a female? Do you have any severums? Can they cross breed with Rotkeil?

 

Yes, they can cross with Rotkeil. It is suspected that Super Red Spotted Severums are a hybrid to begin with, but there is no verification of that. If it is not a hybrid, but a color variant of Heros efasciatus (like the Gold), those two forms are known to cross regularly. It is believed by some that Rotkeil is just a population of H. efasciatus.

Either sex can do the shiver/shake courting moves. It shouldn't be hard to sex the Rotkeil, the Red Spotted can be less certain. The facial markings that usually indicate male sometimes also appear on female Red Spotted. This is one of the reasons they are suspected to be hybrid.

 

Thanks a lot . I came home and see both of them are now not hanging out with each other. So that is the end of courting ritual I think. Or did it shiver for someone else? I am now even more determined to find out what sex my Severum is. May be I should separate it with a pink convict male and a convict female for few days or few weeks each in a smaller 25Gallon breeder. May be convicts will tell me the gender as mine are willing to mate with anything that moves hahahah. So if it’s a male my male convict will tell immediately by showing interest. Hahah

I can’t think of any other way.

 

Yes, they can cross with Rotkeil. It is suspected that Super Red Spotted Severums are a hybrid to begin with, but there is no verification of that. If it is not a hybrid, but a color variant of Heros efasciatus (like the Gold), those two forms are known to cross regularly. It is believed by some that Rotkeil is just a population of H. efasciatus.

Either sex can do the shiver/shake courting moves. It shouldn't be hard to sex the Rotkeil, the Red Spotted can be less certain. The facial markings that usually indicate male sometimes also appear on female Red Spotted. This is one of the reasons they are suspected to be hybrid.

chromedome52
Last night I took my other red spotted severum and put both of them together to see whether they are indeed a male/female pair.

Put them in a 25 Gallon breeder. After a bit of shaking and shivering they started liplocking. I was not sure they were terrotorial fight or a mating behavior., Usually fighting liplock, fishes attack on sides too. But they only lip locked. No other bites or pecks on the sides.

I separated them again 2hours later. But wanted to take a video and ask you, whether anyway you can make out whether these are same sex or opposite sexes? I feel both are females.

The original video is 2minute long I trimmed it to highlight the main parts. Your comments are really appreciated. Severums have some unique mating behavior don't they? Both these fishes were shivering and shaking previously in their respective older 50G tanks.

 

One of the more consistent ways to identify sexes on many Cichlids is the abdominal profile between the ventrals and the analfin. At the end of that video, it was clear that the fish on the left had a concave (slightly sunken) belly line, which usually indicates a male. The breeding tube was slightly visible as well, and that also looked more male than female. Both fish had facial markings, which in normal species indicates males. However, I've seen verifiable females (they were laying eggs) of Red Spotted with as much color on the face as the male. (This is one of the reasons for suspecting that it is a hybrid.)

I'm not sure whether that was sexual activity or just territorial dominance "discussions". If they are both new to the tank, opposite sexes could still have these faceoffs to establish dominance. The lovemaking would come a bit later !

 

One of the more consistent ways to identify sexes on many Cichlids is the abdominal profile between the ventrals and the analfin. At the end of that video, it was clear that the fish on the left had a concave (slightly sunken) belly line, which usually indicates a male. The breeding tube was slightly visible as well, and that also looked more male than female. Both fish had facial markings, which in normal species indicates males. However, I've seen verifiable females (they were laying eggs) of Red Spotted with as much color on the face as the male. (This is one of the reasons for suspecting that it is a hybrid.)

I'm not sure whether that was sexual activity or just territorial dominance "discussions". If they are both new to the tank, opposite sexes could still have these faceoffs to establish dominance. The lovemaking would come a bit later !

I separated them right after the video because I didnt wanna continue before getting some expert advise. So, I took one of them and put back in it's older 50G grow out which it shares with many 2"-3" and smaller cichlids (An electric blue acara, A gold saum, 3" Convict female and a 3" Green Severum and few cory cats).

The remaining one is now in the the same breeder 25G cube with two 2.5" female pink convicts(which is a bit small for my liking but its just a temporary stay) but, it doesn't show any interest in the female convicts and convicts don't seem to be interested to. Both the female convicts had fry before, so right now I am put them in the breeder to prevent further mating with other convicts I have. Only one convict was in that breeder until yesterday, yesterday I put the other one after removing the fry from my 20G.

My other two breeder tanks are actively occupied by two couple with fry/eggs(one is a 40G and another is a 33.7G). May be I should find out the sex later after the current breeding season over. As I have enough fry to take care now. Thinking of using convict fry as feeder for my Oscar and Flowerhorn when they are an inch or more.