Just caught this beautiful Hypancistrus!

[jackson827]

[bekateen]

Beautiful indeed! Where did you catch it?

[catfishchaos]

Could it be

Hypancistrus sp(l236)

?


More info would be very helpful in solving for H ;)

[Jools]

Yes.

Jools

[smitty]

Very nice catch. Where did you catch or pick him up from.

[jackson827]

It was from Lower Rio Iriri.

[Brian2014]

This is a old pic from Plecoplant L236? http://www.plecoplanet.com/forum/showthread.php?t=22397

[catfishchaos]

Well now I am a little confused, I see that photo on that thread from a 2014 and it does not have your water mark...

[bekateen]

That's an interesting link, for a couple of reasons: (1) it reveals the fact that the photo above (which must be about two years (or more) and originates from a photobucket photo album attributed to "leisure_man" or "Dummy 216") is not of any actual fish caught right now {although this does not negate the possibility that the OP indeed caught a specimen of this type of fish, and just borrowed the photo for display purposes}, and (2) in the same link, leisure_man states that he is about to get a shipment of L397. So far, he is the only person (of whom I am aware) that sells L397 in the USA through Aquabid (seller name, "Wethumbs": http://www.aquabid.com/cgi-bin/auction/ ... 1456652959). I guess that 2014 acquisition worked out for him. Cool.

Cheers, Eric

[jackson827]

An exporter sent this pic to me, said he caught this fish, and ask me to buy it. I asked if I can use his photo, he said yes. So I put a watermark on it. If this photo is belonged to someone else I remove it right away.

Here is a wild L236 I received last month, cheers.

[Jobro]

Do you have pictures of that fish in a tank? from sides? without stress coloration? please share!

[TwoTankAmin]

Just a thought here. I have a copy of Loricaiids of the Middle Xingu from 2013 by Mauricio Camargo, Heriberto Gimenes Junior, Leandro melo de Sousa and Lucia Rapp Py-Daniel. It is a dual language book in German and English. The following statement appears on page 174:

contrary to what is said elsewhere, there isn't evidence of a Hypancistrus species occurring on Iriri river.
{or in German}
entgegen andere Äußerungen gibt es bisher keine Anzeichem für Hypancistrus im Rio Iriri,

So my feeling is that jackson827 was probably lied to by whomever gave him that capture location.

Do a PC search of Hypans from the Iriri and only 2 come up, the mythical L250 and the L400. But the latter is also listed as being found in the Xingu which would make it the lone pleco that is found in both places. It is also listed in a third river.

Do a PC search for all species in the Iriri and 16 come up including one whiptail and one cory. But only those 2 Hypans. I may doubt the validity of the location data but I cannot say it is unquestionably incorrect. I have never been there, so I must rely on information from those who have.

[jackson827]

Do you have pictures of that fish in a tank? from sides? without stress coloration? please share!

Sure, I will post a short video I shot and show the lively fish rather than pictures.

[jackson827]

Just a thought here. I have a copy of Loricaiids of the Middle Xingu from 2013 by Mauricio Camargo, Heriberto Gimenes Junior, Leandro melo de Sousa and Lucia Rapp Py-Daniel. It is a dual language book in German and English. The following statement appears on page 174:

contrary to what is said elsewhere, there isn't evidence of a Hypancistrus species occurring on Iriri river.
{or in German}
entgegen andere Äußerungen gibt es bisher keine Anzeichem für Hypancistrus im Rio Iriri,

So my feeling is that jackson827 was probably lied to by whomever gave him that capture location.

Do a PC search of Hypans from the Iriri and only 2 come up, the mythical L250 and the L400. But the latter is also listed as being found in the Xingu which would make it the lone pleco that is found in both places. It is also listed in a third river.

Do a PC search for all species in the Iriri and 16 come up including one whiptail and one cory. But only those 2 Hypans. I may doubt the validity of the location data but I cannot say it is unquestionably incorrect. I have never been there, so I must rely on information from those who have.

Yes, I agree.
Collection point is always a secret. Fishermen never tell the actual location where they found a precious specimen.
Such as L250, nobody knows the actual collection point. Only one fisherman caught 8 of them, and he never do it again. Therefore, it becomes a myth.

L236, the fisherman told me that it lives in somewhere with strong current, and its very hard to dive down to the bottom to catch it. That's why it is another extremely rare Hypancistrus sp.

From my observation, L236's streamline body shape, very sturdy caudal peduncle and big caudal fin indicate the adaptation of living in fast current environment, so beside the collection location what the fisherman told me might be true.

Compare to other wild caught Hypancistrus sp. (46,173, 333, 400, Lower Rio Xingu) I keep, L236 is a very interesting one to watch. It is always very alert and extremely aggressive toward other Hypancistrus, even the female L236 can easily defeat males of other species with similar size. Maybe its bright color is a warning signal to other similar fish that this area belongs to someone else and don't get close.

Rio Xingu is a very big river with massive ecological niche, further research would be helpful to understand the distribution of Hypancitrus species especially these legendary sp. and the speciation of this genus. However, it is nearly impossible to search all the points in this BIG river because it's too big, too dangerous and cost a lot.

[Jools]

These things are colour forms of probably L066 (and research will likely show all this up in the next year or three). In terms of it's collection locality, that along with a lot of what is written here is here-say. The fishermen say that nice fishes are from far away for a variety of reasons. Firstly is to throw others off the scent, secondly, the Iriri is a long trip for the fishermen from their base in Altamira. We perpetuate these tales as we write things in forums, it's not helped by some of them being published in books that were written before we knew more.

Best I can do is say that most species of Xingu plecos live in strong current, I never saw a single Hypancistrus when I was in the Iriri nor did I hear tell of any, I did however dive to about 5 or 6 metres and saw Hypancistrus zebra elsewhere. The species flocks of very variable coloured Hypancistrus occur downstream of Altamira.

We are also dealing with a photo that's been around on the internet for years, the OP has posted their own copyright making it seem like it's their photo and also has titled their post to make us think they've just collected this fish in the wild. Draw from that your own veracity levels.

Jools

[jackson827]

What about the size, body shape, and behavior differences?

L66 is a much bigger fish, body lenghth can be 15cm.
L236 is much smaller, maximum body length is just 12cm.
L66 is a much robust fish when it reaches adult size.

There is also behavior difference between these two sp.
L236 is the most aggresive hypancistrus sp, and L66 is much easy going fish.

[PseudaSmart]

The same characteristics apply to humans yet to my knowledge except for a few Neanderthals running around we are all the same specie.

Opinions without data are only opinions.
As this is the definitive forum on the web as a result of the extensive database and knowledgeable experts most answers are clear cut without new evidence.

[jackson827]

The same characteristics apply to humans yet to my knowledge except for a few Neanderthals running around we are all the same specie.

Opinions without data are only opinions.
As this is the definitive forum on the web as a result of the extensive database and knowledgeable experts most answers are clear cut without new evidence.

I would like to see the database about L66 and L236 someday.
But now there is no such data to prove anyone's OPION, it's not clear cut yet.

What I said is just from my own observation. You can read the L236 article written by Ernst Schmidt from this website, his observation is same to mine.
Ichthyologist usually not keep live specimen, and the behavior of fish needs to be studied too.

Even though it is hard to separate L236 from L66, L333, L399, and L400, and there is some variation specimen have similar color morph like L236, that's not mean they are same.

Why they have such similar color? Do they mimic each other? Or are they just some bizarre individuals with abnormal color?
If they are the same species why they have different head shape, body shape, and other physical differences?
There is a lot of questions about the Hypancistrus genus.
Hope someday we can fully understand this most complicated genus of pleco.

[Acanthicus]

Hi,

If they are the same species why they have different head shape, body shape, and other physical differences?

thats intraspecific variation. The differences are very small, often its not possible to determine any at all. I am not a lumper, but the different phenotypes we know of this "species" all originate from different catching locations with different current, different stones, different depths the fishes live in. Similar phenotypes are not occurring together, they get adapted to the given environment by (mostly) abiotic factors and this results in a different habitus, including adult sizes - nothing uncommon in biology.

Concerning Rio Iriri, it is a myth. I talked to at least 20 persons who have been there nobody saw any Hypancistus there. I was there myself, there was no Hypancistrus. Rio Iriri is very different to Rio Xingu,much more shallow, broader in relativity and therefore its not surprising that nobody ever recorderd and proved a Hypancistrus from there. As Jools said, the fishes with a lot of white originate from a deeper place with very strong current, thats what trustable fishermen told me and I guess the same told Jools.

We now know almost for sure that L 250 is nothing else than a strange coloured H. zebra, a hypothesis we had for a few years, we were just missing some data, which we finally found on that damn social network.

But I think we will keep discussing about this again and again until the complex gets officially described and even further. There is too much wishing and commercial interest in this group beside the scientific background.