Panaque nocturnus

[matthewfaulkner]

We may have been calling it L350 for a long time, but the original photo of L350 in DATZ is not of this species.

Am I making any sense?

I disagree with this. But just to make sure, we are talking about this picture?

http://www.datz.de/Artikel.dll/l-345-bi ... 5DAB903EC0

The original picture of L350, is a Hemiancistrus pankimpuju. Here's a few pictures of my Hemiancistrus pankimpuju that match the DATZ's L350.









Hopefully that helps clarify, not confuse more.

[Erlend D Bertelsen]

I see your point Rupert. Also, for me, the eye diameter is much smaller than in Erlend's fish.

I wonder if Erlend's fish might be

L329

and indeed that is P. nocturnus. I note that's where I've put it in the past.

Jools

The pictures I have i the Cat-eLog on L-329 is not the same fish as I have here. The picture of L-329 in Cat-eLog is cathed in Rio Hullaga.

E

[Borbi]

Hi,

note also that the original L 350 publication by DATZ came with a mouthshot (see the Matt´s link).
And while I concede that that might be hard to see with such a compressed PDF-file, the original picture clearly shows the "non-Panaque" type dentition.
So I am pretty sure that what we call L 350 now matches with the original L 350.

Cheers, Sandor

[racoll]

Thanks guys. You are correct.

So it seems that H. pankimpuju can be either jet black, white, or brown with black spots?! All the specimens in the cat-elog are of the black or white types, so I didn't know they were so variable.

The next question is, are the spotted brown ones (L350) actually likely to be conspecific with H. pankimpuju then? I don't have a copy of the description to check, however.

[racoll]

So the description of H. pankimpuju only reports the white phenotype, and this is used as a primary diagnostic character.

What else do we know?

Why are the black, and brown-spotted phenotypes considered conspecific?

[Borbi]

Hi Racoll,

Why are the black, and brown-spotted phenotypes considered conspecific?

..the blunt answer I could offer would be because they can "change" their coloration quite a bit, at least according to my observations at importers.
In this fish (as well as in L 351) it appears to depend a lot on a combination of stress level and age/size if you find them mottled or jet-black. Note that I never actually kept one, I´ve only seen a number of individuals at importers over the years.

What we know for sure is that the white "variant" changes back to black over some time in the aquarium, just like Parancistrus aurantiacus.

Would be very helpful, however, if someone who raised small(ish) H. pankimpuju over some years chipped in on that.

Cheers, Sandor

[Jools]

Thanks guys. You are correct.

So it seems that H. pankimpuju can be either jet black, white, or brown with black spots?! All the specimens in the cat-elog are of the black or white types, so I didn't know they were so variable.

The next question is, are the spotted brown ones (L350) actually likely to be conspecific with H. pankimpuju then? I don't have a copy of the description to check, however.

Rupert,

I am inclinded to see them all as conspecific. If Matt would be able to let us use the pictures posted above I would probably put them in that species page. They do all seem conspecific to me but I am with you in that I've only seen black or white ones.

I also don't know what L351 looks like as an adult. My initial thought was that Matt's fish maybe was this, but that was a guess. Matt, why do you know your fish is L350 and not L351?

An interesting note on this, when I first saw this fish it was in exporters in Iquitos, they were the fish everyone there wanted to show me. They had just found out that if they kept (adult) ones in the white bathroom tile lined vats that were ordinarily used for Stingrays and Electric eels, then they went white. They actually offered to put a black on in and I could come back tomorrow and see it white which apparently it did overnight. I didn't have the time to do this, but I was happy to believe them - the one in there was very white!

The others they had in tanks were that glossy black that reminded me so much of coal - hence I used that for their common name.

Jools

[matthewfaulkner]

If Matt would be able to let us use the pictures posted above I would probably put them in that species page. They do all seem conspecific to me but I am with you in that I've only seen black or white ones.

I also don't know what L351 looks like as an adult. My initial thought was that Matt's fish maybe was this, but that was a guess. Matt, why do you know your fish is L350 and not L351?

Yes you can use my pictures (assuming we agree that my fish is Hemiancistrus pankimpuju/L350) just let me know what to do.

I don't unequivocally know it is or isn't L350. It was imported and bought as L350 and I have no reason to doubt that it is. My fish had a black body colour but it's fin were slightly lighter in colour with mottled spots, and to my eyes, matches the original DATZ image perfectly. My fish also does not have an iris operculum and it's teeth/shape/structure were not like a Panaque.





And a youtube video seeing him in action. Forgive the quality and editing.