Frenatus or not?

[justarn]

Been assuming this is a frenatus but not sure, anyone wanna confirm?

 

[justarn]

Bump

 

[Cosmic_surfer]

It is a pretty eel, that is for sure. I honestly don't know what it is though. I have only ever seen fire, tire track, and peacock eels. And I am fairly certain there are a few eels that are classified as tiretrack. I wish I could get some of the lesser known less common eels, but here in Nebraska, even a regular fire eel is considered exotic lol.

 

[justarn]

Very long compared to others, tbf I stumbled on this in a small lfs just labeled as spiney eel...

 

[Chub_by]

Looks like it for sure, we'd need the collection point (or at least continent) for a sure ID though.

 

[justarn]

Yeah can't do as it was a mystery buy, I saw and thought thats odd lol... knew it wasn't anything regular.
I had two but one wasn't feeding, this guy is putting some size on now. Will get some more pics when I can.

 

[Josh's Fish]

I've seen these pop up a few times in the UK. There's over 80 described species of Spiny Eel and many still undescribed, so it's incredibly hard (and in some cases impossible) to get an ID on some of them.

I've narrowed it down to a few.

Mastacembelus albomaculatus, markings are still quite different and headshape very different.


Mastacembelus liberiensis (markings are washed out, as I think this was a deceased specimen)


Mastacembelus moorii (headhshape still looks a little stumpy on this one and the eyes are very protruding)

I'd be happy to call it Mastacembelus cf. moorii, the cf. meaning "to compare" as it looks most like this specimen.


Hope this helps

 

[justarn]

Brilliant reply and a spanner in the works!-)

 

[F3l1ss]

The nose looks really different to Mastacembelus cf. moorii, though don't you think? Any chance of getting a close up of the nose?

 

[Josh's Fish]

The nose looks really different to Mastacembelus cf. moorii, though don't you think? Any chance of getting a close up of the nose?

The nose is very different to Mastacembelus moori, which is why I called it Mastacembelus cf. moori. The cf. means it is a comparison to that species. Of the 80+ described species w. image reference, it resembles Moori the most.

It may actually be just a regional variant of M. moori (which explains headshape and protruding eyes) and no need for the cf, but it is impossible to tell for sure.