Ancistrus species, but which one?

Tuti · Post by **Tuti** » 09 Apr 2007, 15:24

Last week I bought 3 new catfish from store. They sold them as L183 - ANcistrus dolichopterus.

See pic's below:

Picture 1
Picture 2
Picture 3

When I take a look in the Cat Elog, then I see that the L183 has a white stripe on it's fins, the species I bought doesn't.

Now I think it is possible that I bought L182 - Ancistrus punctatus.

Is there anybody who can say what kind of Ancistrus species I have?

Excuse me for my bad english.

Oliver D. · Post by **Oliver D.** » 09 Apr 2007, 22:31

Hello!

Your fish have 7 soft-rays in the dorsal fin.

Definitely not Ancistrus dolichopterus(L 183) - they have usually 9 soft-rays. Rarely 8 or 10...

Best regards,
Oliver

MatsP · Post by **MatsP** » 10 Apr 2007, 10:58

Unfortunately, there are more than a couple of different Ancistrus with a black body and white spots. L182 is one of those, but by far not the only one - there may even be more than the handfull that are listed as L-numbers, becuase most medium sized rivers have their own varieties of Ancistrus, so there may be many more than there is any documentation of right now.

Unless you have a capture location, it would probably not be particularly easy to determine what species yours is, as it's got the "common" number (7) of soft dorsal rays (this is a L183 identification trick that I just picked up the other day, thanks to Yann explaining to me - although it's in the original description from 1854 or whenever Kner described )

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Mats

Tuti · Post by **Tuti** » 10 Apr 2007, 18:00

Thanks you both for replying.

When I bought the fish, the shopkeeper said something about Manaus, but I'm not sure if he meant the fish were catched in that area.

I took the Mergus WElsen atlas, but there are also many many many Ancistrus species described. I never realized there are so much of this kind!

One more question: Do juveniles already create a 'beard'? or is this depending on the species?

MatsP · Post by **MatsP** » 10 Apr 2007, 18:04

Just like humans, "beard" only grows on relatively mature males, with females having nearly none throughout their life (although in some species the females grow more "beard" than in other species). The technical term for "beard" is "head-tentacles" by the way. They are often called bristles, but this is technically incorrect, as the tentacles are actually very soft (the don't "stand up" out of water).

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Mats

Tuti · Post by **Tuti** » 10 Apr 2007, 18:56

When the head-tentacles grow when the fish become mature, I can exclude some of the 'larger' ANcistrus-species. I think the biggest one is about 8 centimeters.

I hope I haven't bought 3 males

All 3 have head-tentacles, but only 1 has 'big ones'. The other 2 have tentacles that are much smaller (like on the pictures). What do you think: the one on the pictures, male or female?

Oliver D. · Post by **Oliver D.** » 10 Apr 2007, 19:02

On the first picture i see one male and a "could be" female. The other fish have a flash on the head.
The second and third picture shows "could be" females.

Best regards,
Oliver

MatsP · Post by **MatsP** » 11 Apr 2007, 10:23

You may well have males and females, and the fact that they have tentacles at 8cm doesn't mean that they aren't going to grow another 5cm or more. I have seen some that have bristles at around 5cm, but they still grow to more than 10 cm, so there's no telling from that (other than the fact that they are no longer "babies" - they are "teenagers" at least).

Some species, the females get bristles too, so that's not a secure method of telling the sex - just one of several keys that together help you tell which is which.

I wrote a littel guide to sexing Ancistrus.

Here: http://www.planetcatfish.com/faq/index. ... 7&catid=15

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Mats

Tuti · Post by **Tuti** » 12 Apr 2007, 18:04

MatsP, Thanks for the link to that article. It's a very good indication I think, but it made me also more confused, because it says that only MALES have forked tentacles, and tentacles on the whole face. But the biggest Ancistrus I have, has tentacles on the face, but they are not forked!

Another thing: when I bought the fish, the biggest fish' tentacles still stand up, and the smallest don't. Could this be a sexing-indication?

But anyways, I think I have to be patient until they grow up a bit more, and all I can do is hope that I have at least 1 female

I want to thank you all for reacting this topic

MatsP · Post by **MatsP** » 12 Apr 2007, 18:16

Tuti wrote:MatsP, Thanks for the link to that article. It's a very good indication I think, but it made me also more confused, because it says that only MALES have forked tentacles, and tentacles on the whole face. But the biggest Ancistrus I have, has tentacles on the face, but they are not forked!

It's more like "females never have forked tentacles", rather than "males have forked tentacles". Forks appear as the animal ages, and if your's are still young, they may well not have forked yet.

Another thing: when I bought the fish, the biggest fish' tentacles still stand up, and the smallest don't. Could this be a sexing-indication?

Don't think it's a good indication. Probably just depending on mood, condition and age.

But anyways, I think I have to be patient until they grow up a bit more, and all I can do is hope that I have at least 1 female

Good idea.

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Mats