New species of fish discovered in Arunachal Pradesh

New species of fish discovered in Arunachal Pradesh
TNN | Feb 23, 2013, 12.28 AM IST

ITANAGAR: Much to the delight of zoologists in the state, a new species of catfish under the genus Pseudolaguvia has been discovered in East Siang district of Arunachal Pradesh.

Amateur naturalist Lakpa Tamang discovered the fish at Sille river recently, the principal investigator of Centre of Biodiversity under Rajiv Gandhi University (RGU), professor D N Das, informed here on Friday.

This is the first new species under the genus, which was found in the upper Brahmaputra river drainage system. The news of the discovery has already been published in the New Zealand-based 'Zootaxa' journal.

Professor Das said the discovery of the new species of miniature catfish, which has been named Pseudolaguvia Viriosa, from Arunachal Pradesh was 'new to science'. The species was described taxonomically by Tamang, and he deposited its holotype to the Zoological Survey of India, Itanagar, and the RGU museum.

Members of the genus Pseudolaguvia are small south Asian catfishes belonging to the family Sisoridae. They inhabit hill streams and large rivers, and are so far known only to inhabit the Ganges river drainage (northern India) southwards to the Bharathappuzha river (southern India) drainage and eastwards to the Sittang river drainage (Myanmar).

Including this new species, there are now only 15 valid species under the genus across the world. Tamang also reportedly discovered two more new species of catfishes - Erethistoides enkhiensis and Glyptothorax dikrongensis - from Senki stream and Dikrong river here in the last few years.

This discovery only tells us that there are many more treasures out there to be discovered. Unfortunately, I guess we might be losing them even before discovery. The number of dams planned in the rivers are amazing. India is trying to build dams to counter the chinese. With this competitive damning of the rivers, where are we heading? When will it stop?