Mostly collected in the in the rio Negro basin, Amazonas state, Brazil, and in particular the rio Demini, a northern tributary flowing into the central Negro in the municipality of Barcelos.

P. leopardus was described from the Rupununi River in Guyana and the identity of this fish thus remains unconfirmed.

This ‘species’ is also traded simply as ‘leo…

This species has had several L-numbers assigned to it, with L146 collected from an unspecified locality in Colombia and L232 from the Río Putomayo/Içá.

It’s exported for the aquarium trade under a number of different generic names including Hemiancistrus, Sophiancistrus and Peckoltichthys.

Following Armbruster (2008) it can be to…

L234 was previously applied to M. paranus, which has also has the L-number L113 assigned to it.

However M. paranus is native to the Paraná, Paraguay and Uruguay drainages, whereas L234 is collected in the rio São Francisco so appears to represent an unidentified species.

M. barrae and M. sp. ‘LDA097’ are also exported from the São Francisco system.

L076 and L099 appear to be the same species with the former exhibiting a darker diurnal colour pattern than the latter, though both appear similar at night.

A paternal ‘lip brooder’ which has been bred in aquaria.

Post-spawning the male carries the eggs attached to his labial barbels for a period of 12-14 days after which the fry hatch with a large yolk sac attached, this being absorbed over the next 48 hours or so.

During incubation the behaviour of the male i…

Currently known only from the rios Curuá Una and Uruará in Pará state, Brazil.

The Curuá Una is a tributary flowing into the main lower Amazon channel downstream of Santarém and there is a large hydroelectric power plant constructed on it which supplies power to the city.

The Uruará joins the Curuá Una around 30 km upstream of its mouth and confluence with the Amazon.

Type locality is ‘Nicol Bay, Cape York, Queensland, Australia’, and this species is restricted to the tips of northern Australia and southern Papua New Guinea.

In Australia records exist only from the Jardine and Jackson river systems on the Cape York Peninsula, while in Papua New Guinea it’s known from the Fly River plus some other drainages.

This species was formerly included in the genus Brochis alongside C. britskii and C. multiradiatus, and is sometimes referred to as ‘common brochis’. Juveniles have a mottled colour pattern and are sometimes traded as ‘hi-fin cory’ due to their enlarged dorsal-fin.

C. splendens can be told apart from other ex-Brochis species by possession of 10-12 dorsal-fin rays…

Brochis was first synonymised with Corydoras by Britto (2003), since the latter genus cannot be considered monophyletic if the former is accepted as valid. This decision has been supported in subsequent phylogenetic studies by Shimabukuro-Dias et al. (2004) and Alexandrou et al. (2011), although the name Brochis is still common in aquarium literature. It is likely that the genus will be revalidated and expanded in the future following a required taxonomic review of the subfamily Corydoradinae as suggested by Alexandrou and Taylor (2011).

The genus is included in the family Callichthyidae, of which members are often referred to collectively as ‘armoured’ or ‘mailed’ catfishes group due to the presence of bony plates in place of scales on the body.

Their taxonomy can be confusing, and numerous undescribed species are also thought to exist.