Discussion of Barbs classification

[Innesfan]

Any danio, long-finned or otherwise, is a cyprinid, as barbs are, but they are not barbs.

 

[connorlindeman]

Any danio, long-finned or otherwise, is a cyprinid, as barbs are, but they are not barbs.

Agreed. I think that disqualifies the entry.

 

[Fishkeeper123]

@Magnum Man - not to derail the contest thread, but I would have considered Crossocheilus etc as barbs. It's a hobby creation, barbs. It's one of those things we use to figure out what we're buying and keeping, rather than something directly based on the research. For Corys, the new names don't change the way we call them in the hobby. Species by species, maybe, but if we say Corys (I would love to see that FOTM) we have an understanding.
Not all livebearers are related closely, and not all bear live the same way. The lines between livebearing Poecilia and egg laying killies have been debated a few times. Cichlids can be used for just one lake, Malawi, in a huge world full of those fish, or can apply to regions. They can be radically different, but related beasts. Our hobby is full of categories of convenience.

A zebra Danio is a barb. An Enteromius from Africa is one too, as is a Dawkinsia from Asia.

It’s fine I thought they were allowed from this message. Sorry, I wasn’t trying to break the rules

 

[Innesfan]

Your confusion is understandable. I do think the waters got muddied a bit on this one.

 

[GaryE]

Ultimately, it's Mr Lindemann as contest organizer who decides which Genuses are allowed. I take the wide view, other take a more limited one, but since "Barbs" is a hobby category, it is open to any interpretation. I do consider Danios to be barbs, but where barbs ends and Cyprinids takes over is apples and oranges.

 

[Innesfan]

I do consider Danios to be barbs, but where barbs ends and Cyprinids takes over is apples and oranges.

We'll need to agree to disagree on that one. In my view, the naming of fishes, both 'common' names and scientific, is human artifice. It is a device constructed to allow us to be able to effectively communicate with each other and to be understood. I don't think we will find much debate about what a cyprinid is. It is precise in its meaning. Barbs, as you say is a 'popular' construct but has for the better part of the history of our hobby been generally understood to mean those fish that have barb in their names (and those species from the same genera without 'common' names.). I actually think wikipedia gets this one right. So we have Tiger Barbs, Torpedo Barbs, Gold Barbs, Checkered Barbs, Odessa Barbs etc. We don't have Zebra Danio Barbs, White Cloud Mountain Barbs, Siamese Algae Eater Barbs or Harlequin Rasbora Barbs. All cyprinids, but not barbs. To take a broader view is all well and good, but in my view it muddies the waters and makes communication, as we have seen here, less effective.

 

[GaryE]

I can see it. I think I'm influenced by coming from a French speaking fish club, where barb wasn't used. I had never considered that. Hmmm. I mean, people would say "Des tiger barbs'. Sometimes.

 

[CassCats]

Hmmm danios are in danionidae, and apparently this classes rasbora species with them.

What's interesting is boraras groups and harlequin "rasboras" are in this group, but the true rasboras are not.

 

[CassCats]

In regards to barbs, their subfamily:

 

[CassCats]

And then at same time, cyprinidae covers others also blanketing over danios too.

So it really seems these are very muddled up groups, not really very clear even in taxonomy.
It leads, again, to the question, what exactly defines a barb?

 

[fishorama]

I have a more simplistic ideas of confusion between the difference between "barbs" & cyprinids to me. Cyprinids are a huge group of fish, mostly Asian, more like a "big family" (order?) or is it a family like "catfish" more than, say, "tetra" or "cichlid" or "cory" (in all their many new names). So, is it barbels that define barbs? I think that may have been the origin of the term, but that wouldn't fit with many seemingly closely related fish, like danios & rasboras.

I'll just keep to common names or genus & species for now. But DNA may shake it all up again. Looks & locations don't necessarily mean related...So many new fish than we had almost 50 years ago when we started in the hobby. I'll wait to learn new definitions, new names, new DNA tests, but it doesn't really impact my vague fish keeping ideas of having lots of "schoolers" of the same species.

 

[Innesfan]

what exactly defines a barb?

As I mentioned, I think wikipedia got this one right:

"A barb is one of various ray-finned fish species in a non-phylogenetic group, with members in the family Cyprinidae, and especially the genera Barbus and Puntius, but many others also. They were formerly united with the barbels in the subfamily Barbinae but that group is paraphyletic with the Cyprininae."

Barb is a 'popular' term derived from Barbus, much the same way tetra was derived from Tetragonopterus. Both genera contained many of the fish we now refer to as barbs and tetras. Those terms became part of the 'common' names of many species. The common names and the term 'barb,' as with the term 'tetra,' survive long after both of those genera were massively revised. The wikipedia page correctly adds:

 

[GaryE]

The contests are for learning, not winning... this one is doing well.

 

[Magnum Man]

... and up next Cory's

I didn't realize how big that can of worms was, when I posed the question.... sorry, I'm so far behind on this thread... I spent 14 hours in my truck yesterday

 

[Innesfan]

I have the first edition of Innes's Exotic Aquarium Fishes (1935) and the last, 19th edition, revised (1956). OK, I admit it, i have most of the ones in-between too. I hadn't realized until i just checked that for the entire run of the book, all the Asian barbs, including some of the most popular aquarium species--Tiger, Cherry, Rosy, Gold, Clown, Black Ruby, Checker etc-- are all still classified in the genus, Barbus. So Tigers are Barbus tetrazona, Rosys are Barbus conchonius and so on. It was beginning to change right around the time of the 19th edition in 1956 and Innes includes a note that some of these species are being classified as 'Puntius' in other sources.

Conversely, Tetragonopterus was split up well before Innes's first edition and never appears as the generic name for any tetra species in the book. So 'tetra' endured in common parlance without the reinforcement of the generic name from which it was derived while 'barb' continued to be related to its originating genus, Barbus, for many decades longer.