I know the consensus seems to be you just can't reliably sex an oscar unless you actually see eggs coming out of its vent but I was wondering what you all think about these 3 alleged male traits I've seen repeated over and over...

3 black splotches at the base of the dorsal fin

pointed dorsal and anal fins

a not so barrel shaped body

...because my oscar has all three of these traits.

As far as I know you cannot sex nd Oscar just by looking at it. I have had various males and females and I have spent hours studying them and I cannot tell the difference between a male and a female just by looking at colouration, shape/size and their fins.

OFL wrote:


Yeah that's pretty much what I think but my wife sure would love to find out what our oscar is. Not that it matters since we don't plan on breading him/her so we could just flip a coin.

Or I could toss a small ball and doll into the tank and see which one s/he goes for.

jimw/oscar wrote:


LMAO!!! Try that and let me know how it turns out!

Previously posted Oscar's are Monomorphs and cant be sexed by looking at them....

JamieM wrote:


Dammmit Jamie!! Now I'll never know whether to dress it in the little frilly dress or coveralls I got for it!!

My ex wife is a Witch I could have her swing a plum and pendulum over the tank (ever heard of that? if it swings in a circle the unborn baby's a girl and if it swings back and forth it's a boy)

jimw/oscar wrote:

venting is my only way to know what sex are oscar... but while surfing these thread.
the wifey asked me what is it am i reading about sexing oscar... i treid my best to
explain to her our problem about it and you know what she told me....
"forget about sexing your oscar.... come on and lets do it our own way...."
monomorph or not i am done

PAUL wrote:


"sexy time!!" - Borat

venting...bad...stressful...

but maybe look at how they fight...look for signs of male-female dominance mating, or look for pure all out aggressive fighting, that might help with some of our Os!

mylutino wrote:


Yeah, I wouldn't try venting mine, don't need to know that bad.

But is there evidence one sex is more aggressive than the other in oscars?

STILL WOULD BE GREAT IF SOME PEOPLE THAT KNOW THEY HAVE A MALE AND FEMALE TIGER OSCAR COULD POST PICTURES OF THEM. WOULD BE INTERESTING TO SEE THEM. DEBBBIE (JIMS WIFE)

I think that my tiger is a female and lutino is a male. From my understanding, even though out of all cichlids, both can be lethal, men usually fight to the death and females usually fight to defend or win, especially when eggs or territory is involved. Males are a little worse on a basic level

my lutino has always been more aggressive than my tiger, he is king of the tank, well, until RD decided he was tired of it, but he is in a different tank now, so thats no biggie. Mayweather (lutino) always picks on Mosley (Tiger) and then they will swim around, dig holes together, and hang out in caves, then BAM, they will start fighting again. Then its back to best friends. Kind of like an abusive relationship among husband and wife.. I watch the behavior and I am almost sure that I have a male and a female, they only fight just for shits and giggles, and the tiger will usually taunt the lutino, even though he knows he cant win, seems like mating behavior ("come get sum big daddy" says mosley, guess they are gay? LOL)
But I also think u can get them really full, nice fat belly and all, and look at their pee-pee's. I see a difference in my lutinos and my tigers "junk"...

See, I have it down to a science!