Platty or Swordtail?

Good day,

I have had this fish for almost a year now, it was said it is a platty female, but somehow i don't believe it because it has a darker line on the side of her body that looked like a swordtail's line on their bodies, so would someone help me with the correct ID?

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I'm leaning more toward a swordtail in the pics above - swordtails are generally a little "slimmer" (or elongated looking) than platies. That being said, there is also a very good chance that this might be a swordtail/platy hybrid, as many aquarium strains of these fish have a mixed heritage.

 

Definately sword the longer body shape

 

Agree... swordtail

 

Yip sword has that distinctive lat line

 

I don't know hey... Everyone is saying swordtail, but it looks more like a Platy to me...

 

I'm also with Swordtail

 

Wait, aren't they they same species? Xiphophorus.. The hellerii are only named that because of the "sword"? Google is your friend bud....

 

Swords are related to guppies and therefore can cross breed. Platies are not related..

 

Hmmm, you mean Molly's are related to guppy's?

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Damm yes. Mollys..my mistake

 

I first though platy but these fish are not in my field of expertise. Neither are swords. So I will defer to the groups consensus

 

Xiphophorus is the genus, which contains many species. Xiphophorus helleri is the swordtails we see all the time; X. montezumae is another species with males bearing sword tails. X. variatus and X. maculatus are the platies, in which the bodies are generally shorter, and males do not bear a sword tail. All members of Xiphophorus have males that have a modified anal fin that forms a gonopodium, though.

It seems most if not all members of this genus can interbreed, and as I said earlier, what is pictured above is most likely either a swordtail, or perhaps a hybrid with dominant swordtail genes.

Agreed, but don't stop at your first result.