Crossostoma lacustre
Crossostoma lacustre is a species that we were able to import for the very first time now. It is endemic on Taiwan. That means it occurs nowhere else in the World. Despite its scientific name (lacustre means: „Living in a lake“) it is found in nature only in heavily torrent waters of small brooks. The maximum size reported for that species is 12 cm.
Homaloptera tweedei
Homaloptera tweedei is a chraming dwarf species that reaches only 4-5 cm in length. Although it is not that much colorful it is a real eyecatcher due to its funny behaviour. In nature – we get this species from Thailand – it lives in medium sized streams where it swims over on large stone plates and stuff like that.
Gastromyzon punctulatus (G. ctenocephalus?)
The island of Bormeo is home to a very large number of hillstream loaches. Sadly it is virtually imposible to give a correct name on them, although a great revision of these fishes was published quite recently (2006). But there are many species which are known already but which are not yet described formally and thus it is impossible to identify them. So in the trade we use the catch-all name Gastromyzon punctulatus for this group of species, as it was also usually in the scientific literature until 2006.
Leaving the difficulties in naming the species aside these spotted hillstream loaches are wonderful aquarium inhabitants. As they come from tropical areas they can be kept in heated tanks. The species we actually have in stock has very nice blue fin membranes, but sadly they show them only for a very short time. The fish become 6-7 cm long. Their body coloration varies between light brown and deep black. Scattered over this ground coloration are yellow spots of different size. Currently our species is often identified as G. ctenocephalus.
Gastromyzon punctulatus (G. ctenocephalus?)
For our customers: Crossostoma lacustre has the code 412692, Homaloptera tweedei 421632 and Gastromyzon punctulatus 416562. Please note that we exclusively supply the wholesale market.
Text & photos: Frank Schäfer
