Chitala chitala
| Chitala chitala | |
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| Species: | C. chitala
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| Chitala chitala F. Hamilton, 1822
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Chitala chitala (Template:Lang-bn, Template:Lang-ta) is a knifefish from Bangladesh, India, Nepal and Pakistan,[1] where found in the Indus, Ganges-Brahmaputra and Mahanadi River basins.[2] It is sometimes known as the Indian featherback.[3] In the past it frequently included several related Chitala species, but these are now regarded as separate species.[2][4] The main species confused with this species is C. ornata (clown featherback or clown knifefish); a Southeast Asian species seen regularly in the aquarium trade.[3] The true C. chitala is very rare in the aquarium trade.[3]
Description
Chitala chitala reaches a maximum length of 122 cm (48 in), but more commonly reaches about 75 cm (30 in).[2] It is overall silvery in color. Unlike all its relatives, it usually (but not always) has a series of golden or silvery bars along the back, resulting in a faint striped appearance.[3][4] Additionally, it has a series of fairly small, sometimes indistinct, non-ocellated dark spots towards the far rear of the body (at the "tail"). This separates it from C. ornata, which has ocellated spots. The two species have frequently been confused.[2][3][4]
References
- ^ a b Template:IUCN2010
- ^ a b c d Froese, Rainer; Pauly, Daniel (eds.). "Chitala chitala". FishBase. May 2014 version.
- ^ a b c d e Seriously Fish: Chitala chitala. Retrieved 24 May 2014
- ^ a b c Roberts, T.R. (1992). Systematic revision of the old world freshwater fish family Notopteridae. Ichthyol. Explor. Freshwat. 2(4):361-383.
External links
Media related to Chitala chitala at Wikimedia Commons
Data related to Chitala chitala at Wikispecies
