???Confused???? What Are We Buying!!??

[Lt.]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glass_Catfish

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ghost_Catfish

I want the ghost catfish, but which is my LFS selling? I think (like Wiki said) these have been very confused and misnamed.

 

[nereksnad]

greetings.

here is some links to the 3 species that might look alike, with them you can look at the fish your lfs is selling and judge which one it is by looking at the pictures and/or identification section. there is no way we can tell you without any pics of the fish in question.

Kryptopterus bicirrhis

Kryptopterus minor <- the one wiki refers to as ghost catfish

Parailia pellucida

edit: the more i look at the wiki pages the more confused i get when looking at what planetcatfish has. but i'm sure planetcatfish is more accurate by far.

 

[Lt.]

Maybe, but I never heard of planet catfish, I'll look there

 

[Wyomingite]

Parailia pellucida lacks the small dorsal fin of the other two, so is actually fairly easy to distinguish.

The two Kryptopterus species are nearly identical except for size, K. bicirrhis gets quite a bit larger. The two were actually considered the same species for over 100 years, until the late 80's or early 90's. Most glass catfish offered in the trade are K. minor, and most retailers I've come across don't distinguish between "ghost" catfish or "glass" catfish, They're all sold as glass catfish.

WYite