Micracanthicus vandragti L280

[Marie-Alix]

Hi guys,

I just wanna share a good news with you. I've bought 5 "L201" one year ago to a friend and he just told me that after a dissection of a so-called "L201" it is actually L280. We had a doubt that it was 201 because they were still very small (about 8cm adult). Now we know why.

I have managed to breed these Micracanthicus vandragti. Here are some pictures (in poor quality sorry) of parents and youth.

Cheers

[Marie-Alix]

The babies:

[wijnands]

Since there's extremely little documentation about this species I think for future reference it would be good if you'd document more about how you did this. Water values, temps, food, that kind of thing.

[Marie-Alix]

Sure! I've make a short post yesterday because I haven't the time.

So, they are 5 in a communitary tank.

It's a 125L with:
- 4 Rhineloricaria Parva (wild)
- about 10 corydoras trilineatus
- 15 pseudomugil gertrudae
- 1 couple of apistogramma baenschi (wild)

The parameters are:

pH: 7
Kh:9
Gh:9
NO2: 0
NO3: 10
T°: 26° (no resistance, the water is at room temperature and there is a small difference in the degrees between night and day)
12 "tubes" for the reproduction.

For the filtration and he oxygenation i got an Eheim Professional III 2071 (950L/h) and 2 Koralia pumps (900L/h)
The water is not change very often and it is 100% of tap water.

In the comments I have made, they laid three times in 24 weeks, and there are about 10/15 eggs per clutch. I did not really pay attention to their fry because they were "L201" and I was especially interested in the clutch of my L46. I have already sold all the babies I've collected to a friend. I've keep only one baby because he is "mopskopf", as it is not a genetic problem, i'll keep him for the reproduction.

I'll try to carefully observe and take note the next time they lay.

Cheers

[Yann]

Hi Marie Alix

I did compare your fish pictures with the picture of the type

Micracanthicus vandragti

I find your fish to be very different, and more likely to be what they are

Any chance to make a closer pic of the mouth

Cheers
Yann

[Marie-Alix]

Yes no problem I'll do this!

Do you think there could be a mistake even if one of thoses fish was dissect by a scientific department??
Johan V. told it to me, I think you know him he lives near Paris, one day he told me I may bring you some loricaridae in Switzerland.

[Cristoffer Forssander]

These Looks very close to my "l280". But if they are the same as mine, they are hypancistrus and not microacanthicus.

Cristoffer

[Acanthicus]

Hi,

this is Hypancistrus sp., not Micracanthicus. After looking at the holotype of M. vandragti and the specimen in the DATZ issue, the differences are visible at the first view.


cheers, Daniel

[Unungy]

Interesting. Could you kindly send me some pictures to unungy@gmail.com?

Haakon and I are working on getting a shipment of these guys from their collection point.

[HaakonH]

The fish in this thread are Hypancistrus, not Micracanthicus. I have spent a lot of time looking into the issue of L280 and the confusion about which genus this number is attached to.

L280 is a number often misused for a small Hypancistrus form that looks a lot like L201, but L201 are bigger.

Aqualog must take much of the blame. In the book, several pics show this small Hypancistrus as L280, but a couple of pics showing M.vandragti, the real L280, are also printed.

Several South American ornamental fish traders use the Aqualog as reference, which is unfortunate because of the many errors in there. This is one of them.

M.vandragti has a much lower bodyshape, a bigger mouth and a more pointy head than this dwarf Hypancistrus. M.vandragti only grows to 5 cm, so it's probably even smaller than this Hypancistrus.

M.vandragti is not in the hobby at all. Hopefully, with Saul's help and the right people on site, we can do something about that and finally make the differences even more clear

Haakon

[Barbie]

I would love to get more information on this topic. I have two different groups of these small black and white Hypancistrus from Brazil. I have F1 adults that are quite vividly colored, but I haven't been sure what on earth to call the fry to sell them!

Barbie

[HaakonH]

Barbie;

The "L201 Dwarf" is a form from Rio Ventuari, Venezuela. It will receive it's own l-number in the future. Are you sure that your fish are from Brazil?

Haakon

[Marie-Alix]

Hi,

So, if I summarized my lori are not L280 nor L201 (too small (less than 8cm adult)). What are they then?
I don't know from where came mine, I've bougth them to a friend who have bought his own to someone with the F0.

[Kenneth Wong]

Barbie,

Do you have any recent pics of the Black and White Hypancistrus to show? Adult sizes are only 3.5 to 4 inches TL is what I remember. I'm not sure where some of yours are from. They were received as 136B many years ago.

So it is possible those you have are L201 dwarf.

[HaakonH]

So, if I summarized my lori are not L280 nor L201 (too small (less than 8cm adult)). What are they then? I don't know from where came mine, I've bougth them to a friend who have bought his own to someone with the F0.

Yours could be the fish we for now call Hypancistrus sp. "L201 dwarf". They don't have any other name or number, because they haven't been noticed by the ornamental trade. It's possible and even likely that they have been crossbred with L201, and it's possible that there are several "L201 dwarf" in the trade that are not recognized (kept and sold as regular L201).

They have been sold in significant numbers in Denmark as L280, and several fishkeepers there have also bred them. It's quite possible that some offspring have been spread throughout Europe in recent years, sold as L280.

Be patient, they will get their own number sooner or later.

Haakon

[Barbie]

The group I got from Ken could be from anywhere. The other three that I already had I was told came from Brazil, but no, it was not from a trusted source for me to be sure. I've owned them 9 or 10 years now. I will have to work on taking some pictures. I'll try to get it done before August when Ken comes to visit .

Barbie

[Unungy]

The fish in this thread are Hypancistrus, not Micracanthicus. I have spent a lot of time looking into the issue of L280 and the confusion about which genus this number is attached to.

L280 is a number often misused for a small Hypancistrus form that looks a lot like L201, but L201 are bigger.

Aqualog must take much of the blame. In the book, several pics show this small Hypancistrus as L280, but a couple of pics showing M.vandragti, the real L280, are also printed.

Several South American ornamental fish traders use the Aqualog as reference, which is unfortunate because of the many errors in there. This is one of them.

M.vandragti has a much lower bodyshape, a bigger mouth and a more pointy head than this dwarf Hypancistrus. M.vandragti only grows to 5 cm, so it's probably even smaller than this Hypancistrus.

M.vandragti is not in the hobby at all. Hopefully, with Saul's help and the right people on site, we can do something about that and finally make the differences even more clear

I just sent you an email. I have 200 L201 2-4 cm coming on Monday.
If your theory is correct we should be able to catch few L280 among them.