NEWS104
5
Portrait of the normal aquarium Bristlenose Catfish. At present it isn’t possible to give the species a
scientificname.
Wild-caught yellow specimenof
Otocinclusmacrospilus
Lexicon
Bristlenose catfishes
Ancistrus: from theAncientGreek
word for a fishhook, referring to
thehook-like spineson the
movable interoperculum
(interopercular odontodes),which
areextendedwhendanger
threatens.
dolichopterusmeans“with long
fins".
hoplogenysmeans“withaheavily
armed snout”.
tamboensismeans "from theRio
Tambo".
pirareta refers to the type locality,
"SaltoPirareta".
OtocinclusAncientGreek,meaning
“witha latticedear"; referring toa
grid-likebone in the skull,visible
fromoutside, in the locationwhere
theear is inhumans.
vestitusmeans "clothed,covered",
again referring to theear lattice.
macrospilusmeans“witha large
spot".
Hemiloricariameans "half
Loricaria"; Loricaria is another
catfishgenus.
castroi:honorificname,meaning“of
Castro”.
Ancistrusdolichopterus
Ancistrushoplogenys
a strikingly colored fish to survive in the
wildatall, letaloneendup in thenetof an
aquarium-fish collector – has gone to a
breederof
A.pirareta
alongwithanumber
ofnormal-coloredspecimens.Whoknows,
perhaps the history of L144 will repeat
itself? L144 has in fact largely died out,
supplanted in the trade by a more
attractively colored yellow variant of the
aquariumBristlenose (
Ancistrus
sp.).
All this demonstrates that it isn’t
necessary to travel to the tropics to come
acrossunexplainedpuzzles in the realmof
fishes. Sometimes they can be found in a
corner of theaquarium store...
