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Hi all,

Received these in my shipment this week as a catfish species. I believe they are Astroblepus but am not sure of the species. Any help would be greatly appreciated. TIA

Astroblepus are notoriously difficult to identify to species externally, especially so when the exact collection locality is unknown.

Silurus wrote:Astroblepus are notoriously difficult to identify to species externally, especially so when the exact collection locality is unknown.

Thanks Silurus ! I was noticing that in the few photos I have seen of them. The exact locale us unknown as they came in with my shipment from Colombia.

Do you know yourself or where I can find any information on them ? Are they a rarity ? They seem a bit aggressive towards one another as well !

TIA

If it came from Colombia, it is likely A. grixalvii. Astroblepids are rarities in the trade.

Hi TIA,
You should really "donate" some of those pics to the Cat-elog. Such rareties are always welcomed by Jools and make a nice asset to the site.

Silurus wrote:If it came from Colombia, it is likely A. grixalvii. Astroblepids are rarities in the trade.

Thank you very much !

Marc van Arc wrote:Hi TIA,
You should really "donate" some of those pics to the Cat-elog. Such rareties are always welcomed by Jools and make a nice asset to the site.

I would gladly donate them ! If they are not adequate just let me know and I will try and take some more. Just let me know where and how to send them.

Regards,
Corys R Us

They seem a bit aggressive towards one another as well !

That is to be expected; many algae-scrapers are fiercely territorial. this is a food issue; their food is 'fexed' to a certain area and every speciesmember is a competitor.....

you see the same around the globe, ranging from Gyrinocheilus aymonieri and Epalzeorhynchus in Asia to the African Labeo and Garra and several cichlidspecies (tropheus, Petrochromis, Petrotilapia, Eretmodus) to the many territorial Loricariids in South America (Chaetostoma for example). all are very efficient grazers and all are fiercely territorial in their own personal space.

corysrus wrote: I would gladly donate them ! If they are not adequate just let me know and I will try and take some more. Just let me know where and how to send them.
Corys R Us

Send to webmaster@planetcatfish.com and add your name for the credits.

Astroblepus are definitely among the rarities in the Cat-eLog, with 7 species, of which 5 are not identified to species...

CLOFFSCA lists 54 species, so there's a few to "fill in" the Cat-eLog with. 19 of those are listed with a Country of "Colombia".

The A. grixalvii is listed to grow to 300mm SL.

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Mats

Hello all.

Very nice pictures of a very nice fish Corysrs! Thanks for sharing them with us.

Silurus used the name Astroblepus grixalvii as a potential for the pictured species and the illustration of this fish that I have at hand is certainly quite close to the fish in the photos. But, there are a number of other species that also come close in color pattern (A. choate, A. homodon, etc.) I do not say this based on personal experience, but based on the illustrations privided in the book "Peces de los Andes de Colombia" by J.A. Maldonado-Ocampo, et al., (2005). There is, I believe, a notice on this publication on the Taxonomy and Science section of the site.

Re diet: sidguppy made a note suggesting that the Astroblepus are algae eaters. Although they are known to ingest some smaller amounts of vegetal material, for the great part these fishes are primarily carnivores. The primary diet for practically all species that have been studied consists mainly of a wide variety of insect larvae. Smaller amounts of other invertebrates (crustaceans, worms, molluscs, and even small fishes on occassion with some species) are also eaten. There are some variations on this theme (A. ubidiai from Ecuador is reported to mainly feed on amphipod crustaceans, genus Gammarus), but the feeding trend is always "meaty".

Lee

Hi all and corysrus.

Sorry to have mis-spelled the name of corysrus in my last post.

Lee

Lee,

A source of useful knowledge, as always.

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Mats

Thanks for the kind word Mats.

I am always happy to try to pass along some info, especially as it relates to the natural diet of catfishes based on my ongoing project on this topic.

Lee

I used the term "algae eater" as a generalisation.

many fishes from that description aren't true vegetarians; most feed on the "aufwuchs" wich is mainly invertebrates combed or scraped out of the algae-growth.

their behaviour is the same though; they depend on the "algae mat"; either if they comb out the tiny invertebrates/insectlarvae or go for the algae themselves.
and hence their behaviour is territorial.

I don't know what Astroblephus eats, never kept one. but the behaviour is typical for a fish with this shape and lifestyle. it's predictable.

Hi sidguppy and all.

Sidguppy - good behavioral points and something to keep in mind for those wishing to maintain any of these species.

I was just clarifying things regarding the diet of Astroblepus spp. based on literature reports covering the examination of gut contents from wild caught specimens. This can be very important in developing a good captive diet.

I am working on a web based project dealing with the natural diets of catfishes and I just happened to be working on the Astroplepidae, so it seemed timely to make some clarifying comments to the post.

Lee

Lee,

Is this web-based project available at this time, or planned for the future?

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Mats

Hi MatsP,

First I will say that this is probably going off topic, so I don't know if someone will wish to move it.

The web based catfish foods project is currently in development. I have a website and am in the learning and development stages on the test area.

I was going to try to "open" in conjunction with the Catfish Convention in Baltimore, but a number of factors (learning, editing, amount of material (or lack thereof) on the site, etc.) have dictated that I take a bit more time.

Basically the site will be set-up by the catfish families, and then the genera and the listing of species for which information is available. Most of the presented material will be taken from the scientific literature (with all references provided), but there will also be personal communications (where available)from parties who have very kindly shared their unpublished observations on natural catfish food items with me.

I am now hoping to "open" sometime in late Feb.'07. As it looks now I should be able to debut with dietary information on approximately 20% of the known species of catfishes (and some undescribed forms). The information on each species will range from general comments (e.g. insectivore) to full month to month gut content studies where available. I will be inputting whatever information is available on any species of catfish. Once the site is up and going new content will then be added on a regular basis. This will include some material that is already in hand and new materials as they become available either in the literature or via personal communications. If I wait until even all of the material at hand is input, the time to debut would be much longer. So, I've got to start some place and the approximately 20% of the known species is my goal.

I will certainly be making an announcement regarding the website when things are up and ready to go.

Lee

Re diet: sidguppy made a note suggesting that the Astroblepus are algae eaters. Although they are known to ingest some smaller amounts of vegetal material, for the great part these fishes are primarily carnivores. The primary diet for practically all species that have been studied consists mainly of a wide variety of insect larvae. Smaller amounts of other invertebrates (crustaceans, worms, molluscs, and even small fishes on occassion with some species) are also eaten. There are some variations on this theme (A. ubidiai from Ecuador is reported to mainly feed on amphipod crustaceans, genus Gammarus), but the feeding trend is always "meaty".

An interesting point. I am finding that the Chiloglanis spp I am collecting here are really more like old world "astroblepids" than old world "loricariids" with much the same requirements.
Compare this sp to the above in a generalized sense.


-Shane

Hi Shane and all.

Shane: Your Chiloglanisobservations are interesting. Your conclusion, and drawing the analogy to astroplepids from a dietary sense, sounds pretty durn good to me. I currently have food information on 13 species of Chiloglanis and 11 of these are strongly confirmed to be invertivores (insect larvae, crustaceans, sponges, etc.) with small amounts of vegetal material (a bit more it appears than that generally taken by astroblepids) also being eaten. It appears that they generally, like Astroblepus, may cruise the periphyton, but with a meaty meal in mind as opposed to coping a salad.

Also, nice picture!

Lee

With Corybreed, have been keeping some Garra flavatra for the last couple of months. These guys do a great job on algae! Better than any Loricariid I've ever kept, though that is not many. But clearly they are essentially meat-eaters at heart, and would prefer to be gulping down tubifex rather than nibbling on algae.

Thank you all for the great info.

These guys are most definitely carnivores as they maul their food while do very little algae work.

hey i'm from Montreal and I received two of these fish in my shipment from south america... same look.. same everything.

interesting to note:

of the two there is a difference between them: one has a small fleshy spike in front of his Anal fin (male?) and the other does not. it really looks like sexual dimorphism to me..

they don't swim most of the time but move forward by propelling themselves along the bottom on their modified pelvic fins which move up and down...I'll try to campture it on video. it's really quite neat.

In trying to feed them, i tried algea bits.. which were not particularly eaten.

however, dead fish were readily devoured as were basic sinking carnivore pellets. and an otocinclus that came too close was gobbled up as well. messy eaters...

the (male?) is remarkably more aggressive as the female has gotten pretty beat up dorsal fin wise... i have them both presently in a 15gallon observation tank.