sexing borellii or steel blue

[Ben Rhau]

Hi, I have a trio of apistos that were sold to me as borellii. Two of them seem obviously female (more yellowish, rounded dorsal fin tip). Two pics of the same female attached. One was sold as a male, but I'm not sure. It is less yellowish, and has more blue on the face. However, it has black on the front of the pelvic fins. The fins are slightly pointier, but not exaggerated like I often see online. Three pics of the male attached. Can you please confirm:

1. Do I have a male?
2. Are these borellii or steel blue?

They are about 1.5" each.

Thanks,
Ben

 

[Chromedome]

I believe those are Steel Blue, rather than borellii. You appear to have the sexing correct.

 

[gerald]

You're lucky to have found steel-blue females. The farms that produce them make mostly males.

 

[Ben Rhau]

So I went back to my LFS guy and he acknowledges they're not borellii, but swears they are are wild-caught and not steel blue. Maybe they are caetei? He says he's happy to swap them out later, so I may wait till they get a bit bigger to make a more positive ID.

 

[Frank Hättich]

Your fish are not A. sp. Steel-Blue or A. caetei. They might be one of the A. (cf.) resticulosa forms or the closely related A. sp. Wangenflecken.

 

[Mike Wise]

The vertical bars of too vertical (not bowed) for Wangenflecken, but it is a resticulosa-complex species.