Carcio or Tengara ?
Posted: 18 Feb 2008, 16:45
Does anyone know if the pics on the cat-elog of Mystus Tengara are really Mystus Carcio ?
From the Cat-eLog Data Sheet:
Identification .... Hamilton-Buchanan described this species and M. carcio in 'An Account of the Fishes of the Ganges', 1822 (the original species descriptions can be read here: http://elib.cs.berkeley.edu/cgi-bin/doc ... ib_id=3060). As is well known, the labeling of the plates in this book (unfortunately not reproduced in the web version cited above) is a bit mixed up, and this applies to the plates for M. tengara and < em>M. carcio. This has contributed to the confusion on these fish.
If one follows this original description, M. tengara is a fish that is very similar to (and may even be a junior synonym of) M. vittatus. It appears that M. carcio is actually the earliest and thus correct name for this small species. This fact appears to have been missed, or at least left uncorrected, by those working with these fishes and it continues to be universally known as M. tengara.
This species is easily distinguished by its small size, golden yellow color, and small adipose fin.
