Synodontis hybrid?

[Kryptic]

Today I received two

Synodontis resupinatus

from a hobbyist who was given them with an aquarium they had bought but did not want to keep them. Together with them was a third Synodontis that I was unable to ID from the photos I had received earlier. I think it is a hybrid, it looks a little like a S. nigrita but something is of and the overal coloration is more silvery brown. The fish is about 14cm tl and seems rather old. Also the "hump" between the head and the dorsal fin looks like some sort of deformation, possibly due to hybridization(?).

(I also have better pics and a video on my phone if there is need for more.)

Also a bonus pic of one the resupinatus!

[Kryptic]

Now the more I've spent time looking at this fish the more I've been thinking that could this still be a genuine S. nigrita? Any thoughts on this? The color has gotten more dark brown but the spots are still visible. I had to move the fish to another tank due to my S. zanzibaricus beating this guy up really bad. I had a chance to measure the fish properly and it is 165mm long (TL). I'll try to get better pics once the fish has recovered.

[Jools]

I'd say both the first two fishes are hybrids. The one you have as S. resupinatus looks a bit like what was described as S. galinae but was synonymised as S. eupterus. It's hard to say, the main difference seems to be head shape.





Cheers,

Jools

[Kryptic]

Yeah I have to agree on the first one being hybrid. But I do think that the S. resupinatus are both resupinatus and not galinae/eupterus as both of them have the small branches on their maxillary barbels.