One out of three ain't bad

[GaryE]

Yesterday, I went fishing in three aquarium stores in a nearby city. All were very impressive, and one had a lot of offbeat, interesting nano fish and shrimp.
I bought three species.
The first was sold as Corydoras punctatus. It wasn't, and a quick dig through images confirmed I had the very common Corydoras trilieatus. It was an inexpensive fish, and putting a more exotic name on a common species will help most wholesalers sell a fish to stores that want to offer customers more variety. I'm happy, as I wanted the species I got and knew nothing rare would be in a mainstream store. But as store identifications go, that's zero for one.
Identification number 2 was correct, and very easy to confirm. I got a small group of Corydoras pygmaeus, sold as pygmy Corys. At this point, the wholesaler identifications were at .500. I could see it wasn't the stores, as the kids working there didn't know the fish well. They were good, hardworking people, but all new to fish selling.
Identification number three was obviously wrong, but a good fish. They were sold as "red pencilfish". A whole bunch of pencil species could be sold with that name. Given that they were $4.00 each, and not $15, half the puzzle was solved. They're Nannostomus beckfordi. "Red pencil" is a name I have never seen used for them in Canada, and I'll take out the teacher's red pencil and mark that down as a wrongish identification.

So 3 stores, 3 species, 1 correct name. Does it matter? I don't know, but I guess I'd better go clean the dog's litter box, change the seed in the cat cage and take the rabbit out so it can bark at some of the migratory llamas in the trees.

 

[Byron]

In Vancouver, "red pencilfish" has been used for Nannostomus beckfordi for several years now. When I first saw it, in one of our better independent stores, I raised the issue with the owner and we agreed this was the basic pencilfish that used to be Golden, and whatever else. The idea from the supplier (in SE Asia) was probably to cash in on the rarity of the Coral Red Pencilfish, N. mortenthaleri, or even N. rubrocaudatus. Anyway, ever since then, some 7 or 8 years now, "red pencilfish" is the name for N. beckfordi everywhere here. This species is being commercially raised and has been for a few years, so this is probably going to remain. Wild caught fish that are exported from the habitat areas are more likely to be correctly identified.

 

[GaryE]

They are one of the easier fish to breed, unlike the other pencils. But here, they have been Beckford's pencilfish as a trade name. I guess the 'red' name has migrated, for the reasons you describe, @Byron. If you put Beckfords in a heavily planted tank, the fry just appear in soft to moderately hard water. I consider them to be honorary killies, for how they can be kept. I can't recommend them more highly, if you are willing to keep them in a single species set up.
Fun and rewarding fish to keep.

I was surprised the trilineata weren't sold as julii, or false julii. I mean, they have spots.