Cichlid Scientific Names..any Reform for the Future?

[Mang-man]

I was just wondering if anyone knows if cichlid taxonomy will be more clearly defined in the up coming century?
I get soo sick of one species of fish having 3 different scientific names..i.e. Parachromis dovii, Parapetenia dovii, Nandopsis dovii.
Maybe members of the A.C.A. or dealers have heard whisperings of possible revisions in cichlid classification?..so we call all agree on one name per species for good!
I know it's a very touchy subject, especially with scientists...who named the fish first, has it been placed in the proper genus based upon it's relations, is it really related to these fishes?..etc, etc. And I don't envy their job. So many cichlids are so morphologically similar.
But we do have DNA testing now. Has there ever been large scale testing of neo-tropical cichlid DNA to determine what species are more closely related?
I also don't know if this has ever happened, or if it's possible, but why not have a cichlid classification symposium?...say at an anual ACA convention. Have ichthyologists specializing in cichlids meet with each other and try to hash things out. Discuss. Maybe have notable private hobbyists and dealers involved in the discussion. People attending the convention could quietly watch.. if they are interested in that type of thing.
Just an idea. It would be so nice if things were simplified.

 

[Jason_S]

as for what's correct now, it's all in what site you visit and who you talk to. I have always gone by www.cichlidae.com which is the site owned and run by Juan Miguel Artigas Azaz. his site is the most updated of any that I've visited. most sites will have the date of their last update. for instance, on the species listing on the aca site it says it has the date of their last update and it was several years ago.

as for reform for the future, there are always studies going on to decide which cichlids go where. Juan Miguel has an article on his site about the Herichthys labridens species complex, and in it he mentions that there is an ongoing study as to the status of the labridens complex, which includes the differnet color/locale variants of H. labridens and also includes the species H. steindachneri, H. pantostictus, H. tamasopoensis and possibly even H. sp. 'rio salto'. he speculates that there may be a new genus created for the labridens complex instead of leaving them Herichthys.

a lot of sites out there don't care about updating their lists and/or profiles. using the example you gave:

I get soo sick of one species of fish having 3 different scientific names..i.e. Parachromis dovii, Parapetenia dovii, Nandopsis dovii.

The genus Parapetenia is now defunct and no longer a valid genus. Nandopsis dovii is an outdated synonym. Parachromis dovii is the current, correct name. Hell, a lot of sites still use names such as Cichlasoma labiatus, Cichlasoma dovii, Cichlasoma citrinellus etc. These are no longer correct due to the revision back in 1983 by Sven Kullander. Originally the name Cichlasoma was used for all Central and some or all South American cichlids. As new species were discovered, new genus names were created for them. An example is Thorichthys which was created in 1904 (I think) by Meek to place the newly discovered meeki (firemouth) cichlid and other closely related cichlids into. Anyway, new genus' such as Amphilophus, Heros, Herichthys etc. were created as scientists further studied these cichlids and started grouping them into these new genus. The name Cichlasoma had always been considered a synonym for these up until 1983. Sven Kullander restricted the name Cichlasoma to only refer to the Chanchito's of South America such as C. facetum, C. oblongus, C. bimaculatum, C. amazonarum etc. The name Cichlasoma, therefore, is no longer valid when used as a synonym for say Amphilophus.

There is a lot more information about this kind of thing on www.cichlidae.com in articles by some of the experts in the field such as Juan Miguel, Don Danko, Dan Woodland, Rusty Wessel, Paul Loiselle etc.