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Been doing a lot of research on the Venezuelan coastal spp of Ancistrus lately and came across this. Amazing I never made the possible connection before. Coastal Venezuela certainly was one of the major early export locations (think diamond tetras, Corydoras venezuelanus, etc). Comments?
Pics are from Romanos' (1992) "Peces Ornamentales de Venezuela"

-Shane

I couldn't see much on that image, so I brightened it up a bit:


It looks similar to a sp3, in that it's got progressively larger spots with the smallest on the head, and the staggered lines on dorsal and caudal, but it lacks the complete ring around the caudal peduncle. It also appear to be a female with a little beard, which isn't all that common among sp3's (although not unheard of).

Mike,
I took a close look at the Cat-eLog. Not all A sp. 3 have the ring at the caudal peduncle. It actually seems to show up more on the "fancy" types than the "wild" types. It is possible that Romano's fish is a female, but it could also be a male captured outside the breeding season. I am hardly ready to say with any certainty that it is a match, but could this be A sp. 3 before 100 generations of captive breeding?
-Shane

Compare these.



<image missing>


-Shane

[Mod edit: Update the image links... --Mats]

The original description does state: "...a pale bar across base of caudal fin rays on caudal peduncle..."

I'll gladly post the photo from Schulz (1944) if anyone is interested.

I've that book to as Shane gave it to me as a great present and I've had the same thought too. However, how do you tell this fish apart from at least two very similar fish found in Brazil (that we also haven't been able to ID)? I think there is also a species from Guyana that also matches but I can't remember where I put it. I mean, what we could do is pull all the "ring tailed" ones out and put them in A. bodenhameri. We'd still be left with fishes in A. sp(3) though, wouldn't we?

Jools

I never thought I'd say this, but this might be a case where something like COI barcoding might be the only means to resolve the issue.

I mean, what we could do is pull all the "ring tailed" ones out and put them in A. bodenhameri. We'd still be left with fishes in A. sp(3) though, wouldn't we?

I am not ready to say that A sp. 3 is A. bodenhameri. It does look very similar to A sp. 3 based on the single photo from Romano, but we would need more photos of a series of wild caught specimens of various ages. We would also need to confirm that Romano has the correct photo with the correct ID in his book as the book contains a few mis-identifications. That said, the general distribution of A. bodenhameri supports a theory that I have always had. That is that A sp. 3 came from someplace where collection was very common in the past but has been cut off for many years (thus the lack of wild A. sp 3 imports). Northern Venezuela would match that description, but I agree Guayana is just as possible. The hardiness of A sp. 3 (i.e. adaptability to wide temps and water parameters) also points, to my mind, to a northern South America piedmont sp vs. an Amazonian animal where conditions are much more stable.

HH, Can you post Schultz' photo? That may at least tell us if Romano has the right fish pictured.

-Shane

Here is what Wels Atlas II has to say on the matter....

Apologies for the copying, but I think it would be good to have a second photo of the species.

Here it is a big larger...

Silurus: I'd be interested in seeing the image from the original description.

Here is the image from Schultz:

Oh, well, that's easy then, no way can sp(3) be a match with the description - the latter shows a species with no pelvic fins!

Seriously though, I'm not sure the picture at least takes us much further forward?

Jools

Oh, well, that's easy then, no way can sp(3) be a match with the description - the latter shows a species with no pelvic fins!

I thought there was something odd about it. I just couldn't put my finger on it.

The original description does state: "...a pale bar across base of caudal fin rays on caudal peduncle..."

I've been having a look through lots of Ancistrus pics, but a huge number of species seem to have this characteristic too.

It would be very hard to use this character to differentiate unless it was extremely pronounced.


Shane makes a very compelling case, but we need some more concrete evidence........


Can anyone translate the German in Wels Atlas II? Perhaps this may shed some light on it.

Remember the Chaetostoma spp. mess? Once everybody looked at the original description, etc.....could this be something similar? Just a thought.
Amanda

bronzefry wrote:Remember the Chaetostoma spp. mess? Once everybody looked at the original description, etc.....could this be something similar?

It is kind of the reverse. With we knew what we were calling the fish then looked at the decription and there was a disconnect.

In the case of <em>Ancistrus</em>, we don't know what species (singular or plural) it might be even if we assume at least some of them aren't hybrids (which I'm comfortable with, but keep an open mind on).

In another topic, we're looking at adding pictures from old descritpions. Shane's train of thought that the original <em>Ancistrus</em> came from whatever zone was being commercially exported from around, say the 1950s is a good one. Say that was a Northern Venezuelan species, however, what might have happened in the meantime is that a very similar species from elsewhere (Brazil) started getting exported and our importers just mixed them all up and so, therefore, did the shops and us keepers and breeders.

For the common bristlenose we have in the catelog (or at least some of the pics) to be <em>A. bodenhameri</em> means that this species must have been captive bred for around 8-10 years for it still be seen as young fish in the hobby, maybe much longer than 8-10 years, but I'm basing this on the fact that if we've not seen blue eyed plecs for that long, we've not seen any Maracaibo loricariids, so therefore I'm assuming <em>A. bodenhameri</em> is restricted to this area. This also bleeds into the tale of <em>Sturisoma festivum</em>.

I really will think about adding old pictures from descriptions.

Jools

Hi everybody,

Can anyone translate the German in Wels Atlas II?

I´ll give it a try.. ;) Though I´m far from being a native english speaker..I will skip the origin of the first description and synonymy..

Origin: This species is found in various tributaries of the Maracaibo Lake in Venezuela. The type locality is the Río San Pedro of the Motatán-System (Est. Zulia) at the eastern side of the lake. Ploeger (written notification) caught the depicted fish at the Cano El Sapo in the adjacent Federal State of Merida, which flows into the Maracaibo Lake from the south.

Keeping and Breeding:
This species is not very demanding and keeping it can be compared to the common Bristlenose (which is known as Ancistrus sp. "Brown" in Germany, the A. sp. 3 for you guys). Notes on caring see there.

Specialties:
This species was originally described as a subspecies of Ancistrus Brevifilis by Schultz, Isbrücker (1980) later recognized it as a species of its own. According to Schultz, A. Bodenhameri can be told from the similar and neighboring (silly expression in english....) A. Martini and A. Triradiatus by the light dots, which are most pronounced in the front part of the body and by the black spot located in the lower dorsal, between the the first and the second ray, no black spots in front of the dorsal and a light bar at the caudal peduncle.
All those traits can be found in the depicted specimen. Young A. Bodenhameri seem to have a wite seam in the caudal, wich is lost during growth and adultry.

Transalted from: Seidel, I., Evers, H.-G., Wels-Atlas 2, 2005, Mergus Verlag GmbH, Melle.

Does this description make the common bristlenose A. Bodenhameri? I´m by far no expert with the identification of those brownish bristlenoses, but I´m afraid, these differences match some other Ancistrus sp. as well..

Hope, that helps anyway,

Cheers, Sandor

Thanks for that Borbi.

According to Schultz, A. Bodenhameri can be told from the similar and neighboring (silly expression in english....) A. Martini and A. Triradiatus by the light dots, which are most pronounced in the front part of the body and by the black spot located in the lower dorsal, between the the first and the second ray, no black spots in front of the dorsal and a light bar at the caudal peduncle.

You're right. The spot between the first and second ray, and the pale caudal bar are found in many Ancistrus sp.

hmmmm.

Thanks for the explain, Jools. These species just don't magically appear. They come from somewhere. It would certainly be nice to solve this mystery.
Amanda

Has anyone got a piece of muscle or a finclip preserved in alcohol of a bona-fide, well-identified, capture-locality-known, A. bodenhameri? If so I can volunteer to barcode it (and a couple of sp3).
It wouldn't be conclusive as no other Ancistrus appear to have been barcoded yet, but I haven't got anything better to do at the moment, and it could give us a pretty good idea.

Mike_Noren wrote:Has anyone got a piece of muscle or a finclip preserved in alcohol of a bona-fide, well-identified, capture-locality-known, A. bodenhameri? If so I can volunteer to barcode it (and a couple of sp3).
It wouldn't be conclusive as no other Ancistrus appear to have been barcoded yet, but I haven't got anything better to do at the moment, and it could give us a pretty good idea.

Mike,

Now there is an offer! It'd be worth doing just with a selection of sp.3 from different sources, to see if they all came out the same - and perhaps a control wild caught sample of known origin?

I have sp(3) which I could post, but I'd need to work out how to preserve a fin clipping - any advice?

Jools

You would need to preserve it in 95% ethanol.

Oh, you don't need to send me any sp3's - there's plenty of those around.

Barcoding just sp3 alone wont say anything about the origin of sp3, though, as I have nothing to compare to I would be unable to tell if any variation I found was infra- or intra-specific.

It sure seems like this could be the origin of our species 3.

Not just because of the resemblance but the fact that of adaptability factor of the coastal piedmont environment.

Taxonomic rules are strict so it takes a lot of work to get to the bottom of things, comparing to holotype specimen and all. Even then these things can be debated for years; think discus.

But this is the best set of clues I have seen presented before. It is strange that we collectively breed and raise the aquarium strain by at least the tens of thousands if not more. Not unheard of though.

Aquarium angel fish are very likely an amalgamation of two or more Amazonian Pterophyllum species. There are two valid Amazonian angle species with a good probability that there are a few as of yet unidentified species.

Aquarium strain Oscars are most probably another fish that is a blend of two natural species.

I hesitate to call them hybrids after they have been cranked through a few hundred generations. That is why I referred to them as "blended."

apistomaster wrote:It sure seems like this could be the origin of our species 3.

Not just because of the resemblance but the fact that of adaptability factor of the coastal piedmont environment.

That's too big a leap of faith for me. What if an externally visually near identical species exists other piedmont drainages thousands of miles away...

We're looking at two things here, there's a very good change that this is the origin of sp(3), however, to use your words, has anything been "blended" into it since then?

Interesting to note sp(3) it is the most commonly kept species in the "my cats" register...

Jools

But there's no real surprise that sp(3) is the most commonly kept: it's a GOOD fish to keep (easy to keep, good algae eater, not agressive, etc).

It's also available just about everywhere (yes, I know, some people can't get them for love nor money, but if there's any Ancistrus species that is "obiquitous"(sp?), then this is the one.

--
Mats

Ancistrus "ubiquitous"

Jools,

Definitely a leap of faith. Your point is very well taken. It is merely appealing to see this resolved easily. I know better because these things are never simple. Real idependently verifiable proof is required before we can rightly come to the correct conclusions.

That is because I'm up to my eyeballs in debating issues like this involving wild discus and in particular, Symphysodon discus. to the point of what I believe are called flame wars are going on at http://www.simplydiscus.com
I led the movement to establish "The Heckel Project" and people get emotional about the species and look-a-like imposters. Not wanting to resort to a stringent standard of proof

Same kind of debates go on at http://www.finarama.com
about P. altum but on a more sane but still technical level. Requiring sound taxononmic science and a desire for stringent standards of proof.

I'm not about to get in over my head about Ancistrus sp 3 on planetcatfish.

edit
Amanda