Honeycomb Tatia

[Colin_BC]

Hi all. I've recently picked up a fish from the LPS they had labeld 'honeycomb cat' but didn't have the latin name or any info on it. I brought it home and searched online for a while until I found it's picture and real name (I think). It's called a 'Honeycomb Tatia.' I've found one online fish store with a little info on it, but not much else. Does anyone know anything about this fish? It's fairly lifeless most the time. It's great at hiding. It's mouth is a bit different and always hanging open. Whenever it does swim for a bit, it eventually lands somewhere with a perfect 3-point landing.

Colin

 

[rain-]

Searching with its scientific name will give you more hits. Tatia perugiae.

Beautiful fish, btw =)

Scotcat - Tatia perugiae

Fishbase - Tatia perugiae

Catfishes.org - Tatia perugiae

Planet Catfish - Centromochlus perugiae

 

[Colin_BC]

Thanks a lot rain! I'll be taking that name to the LPS as they had no clue at all to the name. They had it labeled as Honeycomb Cat until I told them it was a Tatia. Now I can give them the full name. Ironically, their breeder has no clue of the name as well....

Colin

 

[MAM]

colin, my lfs called them the same thing.
they are neat looking little fish, but highly nocturnal. you will rarely see them...... if you have a nocturnal set up for you tank, you may have soem luck seeing them on occassion.......

 

[Colin_BC]

I gathered from the appearance of the eyes that they were nocturnal. I've had it about 3 weeks now. For the first week (excluding thefirst night) I never saw it. It stayed buried deep in Java Moss. Since then, it's been coming out a bit more all the time. It still isn't a lively fish, but it lets me know its still around by changing hiding spots a couple times a day, and usually somewhere visible now. I do see the Tatia perugiae more than I ever see my upside down cat. It lives in the java moss, but stirs constantly so it is easy to find.

 

[dantheman59]

I'm jealous! Years ago I studied the anatomy and evolutionary relationships of these fish and I would sure like some in my tank! My hypothesis was that Tatia's family, the Auchentiperidae, or woodcats, were most closely related to the Doradidae, the family that includes Raphael cats and others with those backward-projecting spines on bony scutes that run along the side of the fish.

Little known catfish trivia: Auchenipterid catfish are the only cats with a groove under the eye that holds the maxillary barbel. Another external feature that's interesting is their "pseudopenis" which is an ossification of the first few anal fin rays in the males which stiffens the tube which delivers the sperm to the female. If I recall it might be the only catfish family with this feature and it's pretty rare in fish, with guppies having a similar system. The barbels, especially the maxillary barbel may become ossified as well in the males.

If anybody spots some Auchenipterids in the Sacramento area or even the Bay Area give me a holler!

Dan