PlanetCatfish.com

Hello all.

While I am putting in a couple of posts there is one more thing that I thought would be worth mentioning. It is not exclusive, as you can find some mention of it on the internet. But in that I was recently in contact with one of the people working on the genus Phyllonemus, and he gave me a bit of an update, I thought it would be worth including here.

The Lake Tanganyikan genus Phyllonemus (which is very popular) currently consists of three species: P. typus, P. filinemus and P. brichardi. Roger Bills, of South Africa, with his collaborators (including at least John Lundberg of the U.S.) have been working with new material from the lake and according to Roger they have at least five (possibly six) new species of Phyllonemus to describe! That will be quite some species flock! According to Roger the work is behind schedule, but he is working to spend time on it so that things can get moving along. It will be very interesting to see this work when it is published.

Lee

you can definitely keep me posted on this one!

I've been a long time Phyllonemuskeeper/breeder and for me it's THE catfish from Tanganyika; tie-in with granulosus ofcourse.

I've heard rumours a few years ago about people catching 6-8"? Phyllonemus spp.....now that would be something!
a bright-reddish brown catfish with big eyes, velvetblack mandible whiskers and a silverwhite belly 8 inches big!.....if those DO exist and if they ever will get available for the hobby, they'll give the ol' granny a run for the money and popularity to boot.

I'm very curious if, how and why there'd be 6 or more Pgyllonemus species in Tanganyika. especially what they look like and how they differ.
for example: P filinemus and P brichardi are supposed to be very similar (some authors even consider them the same genus)......

Hello Sidguppy and all.

I have followed your posts on your experiences with Phyllonemus. You are definitely on the right path!

I, like you, will be very interested to see what some of these new species look like once they are described. A confirmation of the large size that you mention would definitely be exciting.

If I get any more info that is open for publication here it will surely be passed along.

The concept of a species flock in the genus is an interesting one (there are already three species, so I guess that qualifies as a small flock) as there is already another one in the same family in the lake - the Bathybagrus flock of six described species. And of course we are all aware of the Synodontis flock of species which will probably turn out to be twice (or more) as large as it is currently known. There is some magic for sure in Lake Tanganyika.

Lee