NEWS108
46
Things sometimes takea strangecourse.For years therewasn't awordabout
halfbeaksanywhere intheentirehobbypress. Thenthemagazine”Amazonas”
madethese fishes,whichareas interestingastheyarebeautiful,thecoverstory
intheirJuly/August1913 issue.AndsimultaneouslyAquariumGlaser imported
acompletelyunknownhalfbeak fromSulawesi,whichwecannow introduce
exclusively,and forthe firsttimeworldwide,here inthe News....
Thebest left till last:
anewhalfbeak!
byFrankSchäfer
Brandnew
Thenewhalfbeakprefers to swim inagroup.Note the individuallyvariablecoloration!
All photos:FrankSchäfer
Theverydistinctive "beak" formof thenewhalf-
beakcanbeseenverywell fromabove.
Nomorhamphus rex
was first described as a
new species inAugust2012.
Nomorhamphus liemi
is thebest-known spe-
ciesof thegenus in theaquariumhobby.
hediscoveryof thenewspecieswas li-
kewiseamatterofchance.Iwasonmy
waytoatotallydifferentothertank inthe fish
roomsatAquariumGlaser,inorderto identify
fishes in it,whenacustomeraskedmesome-
thing.So I turnedoff into theaislewhere the
customerwasstanding andashortconversa-
tion followed. Itwasabout something totally
unrelatedto halfbeaks,butthecustomerwas
standing withhisback toanaquariumcon-
tainingaround70specimensof
Nomorhamp-
husebrardtii
.Itooktheopportunityto lookso-
mewhatmorecloselyat these fishes,as they
wereexceptionallyattractivelycolored.And lo
andbehold,thereweresome totallydifferent
fishes inthetank!HalfbeakbycatchesfromSu-
lawesi:that isalways interesting,asmanyspe-
ciesaren't importedcommerciallyas there is
hardlyanydemand forsuch fishes.
Atpresentonlythreespeciesof
Nomorhamp-
hus
areregularly imported fromSulawesi:the
orange-finned
N.ebrardtii
, the only recently
describedN.rex(whichhas,however,been im-
ported for some time but was mistakenly
thought tobe a color variant of
N.ebrardtii
priorto itsdescription),and
N.liemi
.
Butthenewspecieshasacompletelydifferent
coloration to all the
Nomorhamphus
that I
haveseenuntilnow (seeKempkes&Schäfer,
1998).IsentphotostoJanHuylebrouckatthe
T
