Lyretail - stuck as females?

[Saltyanimals]

I picked up a pair of large female-ish from a LFS. I say -ish because the entire harem seem to be in the middle of the change with the long dorsal fin. All of them about equally large size which I thought was a bit strange. I don't have much anthias experience, but I understood them to stay be smaller females and eventually would turn male.. I seem to have found a colony where they're all in the middle of the change. They are about the same physically.. and fairly large 1-1.5+ inches each. Look identical with the pinkish orange and elongated dorsal.

Question is this: They BOTH appear to be in the middle of the change and one is clearly more dominant. I assume the more dominate one will continue to change, but what happens to the other? He/she won't just turn back to all female. Would the domainly continue to change and eventually kill off the other? Should I replace his female with a smaller female to smack around so there's no question? =)

 

[Big G]

Bump

 

[Angel_Anthias lover]

Some fish are known to change back during the middle of a transition but idk if this applies to anthias aswell, but it would probably be best to be on the safer side to swap it, unless you are willing to risk it and see how it goes

 

[Saltyanimals]

curious if that change back includes physical change like the the dorsal fin. So far they've worked it out and behave like they're paired including keeping the female in check. The male surprisingly is the dominant in the entire tank when it comes to competing for food. Since he swims at the top of the tank, he's first to the auto feeder and really hogs up the food. So much I starting asking if the others are eating enough. And this in a tank of 9 other good size fish including pair of yellow and blue tangs which were fairly aggressive eaters.

 

[Saltyanimals]

Some fish are known to change back during the middle of a transition but idk if this applies to anthias aswell, but it would probably be best to be on the safer side to swap it, unless you are willing to risk it and see how it goes

I'm revisiting my old post since my fish still hasn't changed since the original post. Still have the larger of the 2 lyretail, but it has not gone through the dramatic color change nor dorsal fin change. Still "stuck" lol. I've accepted that now, but still have question on what sex the bigger one is. I'm considering putting in a true transitioned male, but don't want bad things to happen.