It is often said that a tiger never loses its stripes, but what about its name? Matt Ford investigates…

Which tiger is this? The aquarium tiger barb appears of questionable identity. © Mike McGeoghegan

Cases in which a fish long thought to be one species turns out to represent something else are not especially unusual within the aquarium hobby. Notable examples include that of the ‘arulius barb’, for many years referred to as Puntius arulius (Jerdon 1849) but now confirmed as Dawkinsia tambraparniei (Silas 1954), and the ‘kuhli loach’, normally identified as Pangio kuhlii (Valenciennes 1846), a species which may never have been traded.
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A number of aquarium favourites have new scientific names following a recent study. Here’s a handy guide to the changes.

The genus Puntius has undergone some major changes. © Hristo Hristov

Barb fans beware; an extensive review of South Asian Puntius spp. published in the latest volume of ‘Ichthyological Exploration of Freshwaters’ has resulted in a large portion of the genus being split up and many species placed in different genera. Continue reading »

Formerly Puntius padamya, the ‘Odessa barb’ is now renamed Pethia padamya.

The Asian cyprinid genus Puntius is partially revised by Rohan Pethiyagoda, Madhava Meegaskumbura, and Kalana Maduwage in the latest volume of the journal ‘Ichthyological Exploration of Freshwaters‘.

It contains many popular aquarium fishes and has been considered a ‘catch-all’ polyphyletic assemblage for a number of years with over 220 nominal members of which around 120 are currently valid. They’re distributed throughout tropical South and Southeast Asia but the new study is focussed on those species native to the sub-Himalayan region of  South Asia. Continue reading »

A new ‘tiger barb’, Systomus navjotsodhii, is described by prominent ichthyologist Dr. Heok Hui Tan in the latest supplement of the Raffles Bulletin of Zoology, the specific name chosen in honour of the late Professor Navjot S. Sodhi.

Live individual of Systomus navjotsodhii. © Heok Hui Tan

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