Rineloricaria eigenmanni or parva?

[bekateen]

Following only two months after this thread (Self-restraint failed ), self-restraint failed again. This isn't my summer for restraint.

I was at a store with a tank full of common whiptails, all about 85-100mm SL. Super cheap. They had eight; I bought the largest six. Couldn't resist.

I expect they are

Rineloricaria eigenmanni

or

Rineloricaria parva

. They are pretty healthy looking, but don't have really full bellies, so I couldn't sex them based on condition. I tried to rely on snout shape, if that's even a thing in these (LOL, with nothing else to go by, I prayed that more pointy snout and more rounded snout = different sexes).

Getting them home, I noticed the pointy snouted fish were more contrasting in color (darker bands and saddles) than the rounder-snouted fish. I also noticed something else different about them, regarding the armor plates on the anterio-dorsal surface of the fish. Fish which had pointier noses have a different pattern of plates on the dorsum, between the base of the head and the origin of the dorsal spine (see drawing). What do you make of this? Do I have two species? Or is this a random individual variation? Growth stage? Sexual dimorphism? Been trying to track down this info on Google scholar, but not finding exactly what I need.

Cheers, Eric

[bekateen]

Still trying to figure out how to ID. I've read elsewhere here that

Rineloricaria eigenmanni

will have a dark band on the dorsal. Does the photos shown here match R. eigenmanni?

Thanks, Eric

[bekateen]

During quarantine, I lost 3. Still have 3 left. Here they are. I think 2 males, 1 female. I still suspect the one with dark bands on the fins (middle fish in both photos) is a different species, but I'm also unconvinced since one of the others with a broken band on the fins (left fish in both photos) has had its fins darken up somewhat (visible in photo). Anybody know if these are all same species? And even which species they are? And can you confirm my sexing, that the two on left and center are males, and the one on right is female?

Thanks,
Eric

[bekateen]

Here's a brief video showing the fish from a side view, to try and display their dorsals and caudal fins a bit.

Cheers, Eric

Rineloricaria... but what species?

[Jools]

Can you get a shot of all of the ventral surface. R. eigenmanni should have markings on the lower body. The head plates you look at help with some species but not all.

I agree with your thoughts on their gender.

Jools

[bekateen]

In photo, the female (with palest markings above) is left. Largest male, with more broken fin markings, is middle, and the smaller male with most bold fin markings is to right.

I don't see any significant coloration on the underbelly. So, parva for all?

Cheers, Eric

[bekateen]

Norman Behr identified my whiptails as

Rineloricaria eigenmanni

, not

Rineloricaria parva

. He highlighted the fin banding and the dark bars running longitudinally along the abdominal posterior of the body (visible along the left and right margins of the undersides of the fish in the photo above).

Thank you @Norman.

Cheers, Eric

[Jools]

As a side / supporting note but I'd love to run the numbers on this thought. I would say that, purely on a percentage basis, that > 75% of all Rineloricaria imported into the States from South America are this species. No science or fact for that view, just looking at the commercials.

Jools

[bekateen]

Moderator note: After the fish in question were ID'd and then spawned, this thread was split to a new thread on spawning, placed in the South American Catfishes (Loricariidae - Plecos et al) forum: Rineloricaria eigenmanni spawn