# cherry barbs : male or female?



## Rip

i have 6 cherry barbs in my 55 gallon tank, and was thinking of increasing that number to 10. all 6 of my cherry barbs are red. a few are a deeper red than others. i've read that the way to tell them apart is that males are a deeper red, and females are a dull reddish brown. so all my cherry barbs are red, does that mean they're all males? because none of them are as drastically different as the ones in this pic from wikipedia.....










so i guess my question is, are all females brown like the top one, or can some females still appear reddish, but just not super red? i was thinking about increasing my number of cherry barbs, and was thiniking of having 2 brown ones, and 8 red ones, but then i also read that's almost the opposite ratio of female to male ratio that a person would want. i have a few pics of some of my cherry barbs in my Aquarium pics, maybe someone can tell by looking at those if some of them are females, or they're all males.


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## Byron

You can find info on this question in our profile of this species, click on the shaded name: Cherry Barb. To quickly answer your question, yes, males are red, females brownish and slightly more plump.

Byron.


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## jaysee

That picture is an accurate representation of the sexual dimorphism. There is no way a female could be confused for a male.

IME barbs do best in an even M:F split. This has held true for every species I've ever kept. Too few females and they get pestered too much. Too few males and the aggression from the dominant male is not spread around enough.

I would get 6 more females. I think you'll find them much more interesting then


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## Rip

thx. the reason i was asking was because some of my red cherry barbs were a pale red compared to others that were brighter red, that's why i thought some of the paler ones could be females. and the cherry barb profile on this site didn't show any brown ones, so i wasn't sure. i might just get six brown ones then, thx for the help guys.


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## Byron

Rip said:


> thx. the reason i was asking was because some of my red cherry barbs were a pale red compared to others that were brighter red, that's why i thought some of the paler ones could be females. and the cherry barb profile on this site didn't show any brown ones, so i wasn't sure. i might just get six brown ones then, thx for the help guys.


Yes, i couldn't find a photo of a pair that wasn't copyright to use in the profile.;-)


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## amazon21

I think that is a great picture to add to the profile if Rip is willing to let it be used.


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## Rip

that pic isn't of my fish, i just found it on wikipedia, and used the


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## jaysee

The brightest males are the dominant ones, the others will look a little washed out.


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