Just looping in @Erlend D Bertelsen and @HaakonH, as well. Erlend and I have been discussing as well (he's collected/kept these) and Haakon has taken many photos of both. I have also moved a few pictures around today, so images above this point may have changed!
OK, deep breath, here goes!
was introduced (2003) [
here] with a 12cm individual pictured. The front half of the body has a network pattern, back half-striped which extends into the tail which pattern is, however, broken distally.
Generally accepted that L329 as =LDA27 (1996) and LDA28 (1997), however, if you check the images, (best place to do that readily in one place is the 2004 Aqualog All-Loricariidae book, pp232-233, you can see most combinations of the "Panaqolus upstream of Iquitos" at all sizes (young, sub adult and adult) and you quickly get a sore head. I am also left wondering if some of these fishes are P. gnomus. Also, young fish are labelled as "orange long fin" and look a lot like the fishes I photographed in Pier Aquatics, which are now in
.
Seidel and Evers in their excellent "oh, I so wish it was available in English" Wels Atlas band II (p764) show L329 as a sub adult and adult which have no stripes what so ever. Generally, the fishes shown there have a more reddish hue. The species info also references a number of German articles on these fishes which, I suspect, would repeat a lot of what we're looking at here, bear in mind the authors (@Erwin in particular, were heavily involved in the creation of the genus Panaqolus). I don't have access to the Das Aquarium or the original pictures.
appears simpler. The fish has a lower, rounded convex (versus typical sloped larger Panaqolus) head shape, the eyes are a little smaller and the patterning is an ill-defined network patterning. Mostly compared with
in the 2004 DATZ article introducing it, it matches Wels Atlas Band II, and what we have here as
now I've moved some pictures around. Some pictures of LDA28 are L351.
Upstream of Peru, the Amazon main channel splits into the Maranon and Ucayali. The Maranon heads broadly west which in turn splits into the Huallaga and then turns to flow roughly parallel with that tributary and the Ucayali. Although one cannot be fooled by their relative proximity, this is not flat terrain and each river flows in its own valley.
Conclusions? It seems simple now I have really looked into it that L351 is an undescribed species with a distinctive variegated pattern which has three phases from juveniles to much larger adult. In terms of shape, it is more similar to
- the latter has no pattern and even smaller eyes.
L329 is more difficult. I don't know why the jump from the striped 12cm fish in DATZ to what is widely accepted now in the hobby literature ("hobby litt") was made, I can't also see why it = LDA29 (or some of them) either.
Morphologically, L329 appears close to
. Patterning in adults is different, the described species has no body pattern as adult. Geographically, L329 is widespread in northern Peru, imports from as wide as the area near Iquitos (possibly the Rio Yavari) which would also explain exports via Leticia/Bogota, and Rio Huallaga (Tingo Maria) are documented. It seems this could also be the Brazilian (just) species we have from the Rio Amonia,
. NJ mentioned that P. gnomus and P. nocturnus are hard to tell apart as youngsters, this must mean they have stripes as juveniles. Indeed the picture sent by Nathan matches the DATZ picture closely.
So, L329 (DATZ) matches P. nocturnus - compare pictures here. However, L329 (hobby literature after DATZ) does not match P. nocturnus visually but might be considered, taxonomically, within the regional variation of the species. L351 is the longer, lower lyre-tailed species, which at least I had mixed up in some instances with the "hobby litt" L329 (that was silly, really, bad Jools - go visit the optician)!
The final question, what made the hobby literature broaden L329 from the DATZ striped fish to a non-striped fish?
Jools
