PlanetCatfish.com

Hi!

Any ideas about this fellow? Hes 20 cm and was a trade in to the shop, with no specific ID given...
Sorry for the bad pics.

ack i just stumbled over a picture of S.acanthiomas but the ones on the elog arent particularly better than mine so i hope its something else...S.courteti maybe?

Hi!

Since nobody seems to have an idea (maybe the pics are too bad?)
I received an email by Erwin Schraml and he thinks its most probably S.acanthomias.

greetings
C

Going on the long humeral process spine I think this is S. acanthomias and not S. filamentosus which was my first guess.

Jools

I thought that the barbels on acanthomias were white ?

Does Acanthomias not appear as a more slender species or is that courteti?

S. corteti is more slender, yes.

S. acanthomias is usually pictured sporting pale barbles, but I am not certain if this is a characteristic for the species.

Are we sure this isn't a tang syno?

Jools

Hi!

The barbels are definately not white/pale. Only pale thing about this fish is the pectoral hard ray.
I introduced it to my tank and havent seen it since. Quite hard to imagine at this size. Also at night it hasnt chased any other fishes. Just sliding around the driftwood picking up food.
@Jools What tang Synos would fit this color pattern/shape?

Hi!

We went shopping on saturday and i had a chance to peek into an Aquarium Atlas by Bede publishing co. Its a huge 1000+ page book with most IDs and pics (at least from what i can tell) look quite accurate. The acanthomias pictured in the book (3 pics) all had white/pale barbels and clear fins. Sadly they didnt have pics of victoriae.

I also checked the pics on fishbase for Synodontis nigromaculatus which look quite similar except for eye size and humeral process extension...and i thought iding plecos was difficult...

I've been "out of the loop" for a while, so am getting to this late.

I don't know what this fish is, but I'm quite sure it's not Synodontis acanthomias.

• The subject fish has a high adipose fin, originating close to the posterior end of the dorsal, while the adipose fin in S. acanthomias is not so pronounced and originates further from the dorsal.
  
  There is no evidence of barbs on the humeral in this fish, in contrast to S. acanthomias.
  
  As noted by Christian, the caudal fin of S. acanthomias is relatively transparent, in distinction to the subject fish.
  
  As mentioned by others, S. acanthomias has white barbels, unlike this fish.
  
  And generally, S. acanthomias has a more streamlined appearance and a lower nuchal hump than this fish.

The pictured fish does look like a Lake Tanganyika Synodontis species, but I'm also pretty sure it's not a Lake Tanganyika fish. Not S. nigromaculatus, for example.

In my book, any fish that defies easy classification is a "find". Congratulations, Christian!

Dinyar

Thx Dinyar. Lets just hope its no hybrid species.

Any chance of getting a better pic of the humeral process? I'm very intrigued by the shape.
Excuse me if I've been a little slow. Just returned from Sumatra and still recovering...

Hi!

Good to have you back!
When i get a new cam ill catch the fish and take some closeups...will take till next week at least. Any ideas so far HH?

'Fraid not (at least not for the moment). My library is on the other hemisphere at the moment and I am feeling a little naked without it.

For some non-news i checked back with the shop today and they sold the other fish...and they didnt know who brought them in or how old this fish is or anything.
But it shows pretty good how much time a bunch of "fanatics" needs to find out an ID...so its practically impossible for a lfs person to "waste" this time on a fish somebody dropped off...

Could it be S.depauwi?, i think Poll only had one specimen for his bible and that did not have any colour description. But from the sketch it looks slender with a large adipose and comes from the main collecting area on the Congo.
Does anyone have other info on this species.

Could it be S.depauwi?

No, the snout does not seem long enough. Caudal fin lobes also appear to be more slender on Christian's fish.

These differences might be growth-related, but the size of the fish in the photo (ca. 16 cm SL) is very similar to the specimen illustrated in Poll (18.4 cm SL).

My best guess is something very close to S. caudalis, the only difference between Christian's fish and S. caudalis being the orientation of the humeral process.

Hi!

Thx for the effort HH.

How accurate is this Aqualog pic in the elog?
http://www.planetcatfish.com/catelog/mo ... /420_f.php

I also found this pic on scotcat.com

Which of course looks much closer to my fish.

Fishbase seems to be down right now...any special info on this species? Is it likely to be full grown like this?

P.S.: Do i understand it right that on acanthomias all barbels would have feathers. On my fish the four lower jaw barbels are feathered.

How accurate is this Aqualog pic in the elog?

Looks to be a juvenile. Might be the same thing, but I'm not 100% sure.

Fishbase seems to be down right now...any special info on this species? Is it likely to be full grown like this?

Did you try the Fishbase mirrors? Some of them seem to be working at least. Maximum size is 20 cm TL, so it looks like your fish is full-grown (with the caveat about inadequate sample sizes and maximum sizes applying).

Do i understand it right that on acanthomias all barbels would have feathers. On my fish the four lower jaw barbels are feathered.

No, S. acanthomias has only the lower jaw barbels feathered, like in your fish. All synos have this feature, and a few (e.g. S. clarias) have feathered maxillary barbels.

Hi!

Thx for clearing this up...i misunderstood this special feature in the scotcat acanthomias factsheet.
But then again is the fish pictured as acanthomias in the elog the real deal?
http://www.planetcatfish.com/jpg/mochok ... omias2.jpg
Maybe i looked wrong but it seems to me that the top-jaw barbels are feathered.

But then again is the fish pictured as acanthomias in the elog the real deal?

Kind of hard to tell without a close look at the humeral process. Even young S. acanthomias will show at least one or two of the bony projections on the humeral process characteristic of this species.
The maxillary barbels appear feathered (they're actually not) because of the overlap with the outer mandibular barbels.

Finally some hopefully acceptable pics!

lille update
Today i got this email from John Friel:

Hi Christian,

Yes, I returned from Africa a few days ago. After looking at your latest photos, your fish looks most similar to a juvenile S. acanthomias. Juvenile specimens of this species do have lots of dark spots like this. As this species gets older it will slowly loose these spots and the number of sharp projections on the humeral process will increase.

- John