Carassius

Carassius
The Naga-buna, a close relative of the Goldfish
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Chordata
Class:	Actinopterygii
Order:	Cypriniformes
Family:	Cyprinidae
Subfamily:	Cyprininae
Genus:	Carassius Nilsson, 1832

Carassius is a genus in the ray-finned fish family Cyprinidae. The species in this genus are commonly known as Crucian carps, though this term often specifically refers to C. carassius. The most well known is the goldfish (C. auratus), which was bred from the Prussian carp (C. gibelio). They have a Eurasian distribution, apparently originating further to the west than the typical carps (Cyprinus), which include the common carp (C. carpio).

They are not particularly close relatives of the typical carps, but rather form a more basal lineage of the subfamily Cyprininae.

Species

• Carassius auratus (Linnaeus, 1758)
  • Carassius auratus argenteaphthalmus V. H. Nguyen, 2001
  • Carassius auratus auratus (Linnaeus, 1758) (goldfish)
  • Carassius auratus buergeri Temminck & Schlegel, 1846
  • Carassius auratus grandoculis Temminck & Schlegel, 1846
  • Carassius auratus langsdorfii Temminck & Schlegel, 1846
• Carassius carassius (Linnaeus, 1758) (crucian carp)
• Carassius cuvieri Temminck & Schlegel, 1846 (Japanese crucian carp)
• Carassius gibelio (Bloch, 1782) (Prussian carp)

References

• Froese, Rainer, and Daniel Pauly, eds. (2011). Species of Carassius in FishBase. August 2011 version.
• de Graaf, Martin; Megens, Hendrik-Jan; Samallo, Johannis & Sibbing, Ferdinand A. (2007): Evolutionary origin of Lake Tana's (Ethiopia) small Barbus species: indications of rapid ecological divergence and speciation. Anim. Biol. 57(1): 39-48. doi:10.1163/157075607780002069 (HTML abstract)