Grammodes & Dovii Discussion Thread

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they sure do look alike. grammoeds are mean little beasts. you have a nice one.
 
Not that I'm an expert or anything, but I've always felt grammodes should be included with the guapotes. Their physical features are just too close to dovii aside from their length. They are, like their common name implies, a "mini dovii" in every way. The grammodes is definately more "guapote-ish" (using the physical features of the Parachromis species for reference as to how "guapote-ish" an unclassified guapote is) than the beani or istlanum in my opinion. Please take into account, I base my opinion solely on head/body/mouth shape and coloration/markings as well as temperament.

This is an interesting discussion. Even though classifications are being looked at and renamed all the time (like the jack dempsey recently), it seems as if there is no real order to deciding what should be reclassified. I imagine a giant room full of a bunch of major fish geeks arguing reclassification politics, lol. I look forward to hearing from some big time experts as to their opinions regarding the grammodes and whether or not they should be reclassified. I think they should be. :naughty:
 
we don't have grammodes where i live however the photos you have of yours does bare a stiking resemblance to the dovii. if they aren't under the same family group then something definitley needs to change!! who is responsible for officially classifying fish anyway.

GOOD TOPIC
 
I love those pictures, it's too funny seeing them doing the exact same thing like that.
 
Grammodes are endemic to Mexico, while the most northern race of dovii is found in Guayambre, Guayape and Wampú (Honduras). (Going off of www.cichlidae.com)

There is a little thing called convergent evolution which explains the similar "look". No one who knows salt about cichlids will mistake one for the other...

I had a .pdf file that had a phylogenetic tree but I can't find it.
 
A lot more goes into defining a species than the fish look similar. Here's an abstract of a paper on neocichlid phylogenetics...I can't find the full .pdf sadly.

Rícan, O., Zardoya, R., Doadrio, I., Phylogenetic relationships of Middle American cichlids (Cichlidae, Heroini) based on combined evidence from nuclear genes, mtDNA, and morphology. Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution (2008).

Abstract
Heroine cichlids are the second largest and very diverse tribe of Neotropical cichlids, and the only cichlid group that inhabits Mesoamerica. The taxonomy of heroines is complex because monophyly of most genera has never been demonstrated, and many species groups are without applicable generic names after their removal from the catch-all genus Cichlasoma (sensu Regan 1905). Hence, a robust phylogeny for the group is largely wanting. A rather complete heroine phylogeny based on cytb sequence data is available (Concheiro-Pérez et al., 200/7), and in the present study, we have added and analyzed independent data sets (nuclear and morphological) to further confirm and strengthen the cytb-phylogenetic hypothesis. We have analyzed a combined cytb-nuclear (RAG1 and two S7 introns) data set of 48 species representing main heroine lineages to achieve further resolution of heroine higher taxonomic levels and a combined cytb-morphological data set of 92 species to stabilize generic taxonomy. The recovered phylogenies supported the circumamazonian - CAM - Heroini (sensu Concheiro Peréz et al., 2007) as a monophyletic group, that could be divided into six main clades: 1) australoheroines (the southernmost heroine genus Australoheros), 2) nandopsines (the Antillean genus Nandopsis), 3) caquetaines (including the north western Amazonian genera Caquetaia and Heroina), 4) astatheroines (including Astatheros, Herotilapia and Rocio), 5) amphilophines (including Amphilophus and related genera), and 6) herichthyines (including Herichthyis and related genera). Nuclear and mitochondrial data partitions arrived at highly congruent topologies.
Suprageneric relationships were influenced mainly by the nuclear signal, as well as the
most basal phylogenetic position of Australoheros within CAM heroines. The new
phylogeny of the tribe Heroini provides robust framework to stabilize the taxonomy of the group and for future comparative studies on these morphologically and ecologically
diverse freshwater fishes. Morphology was mostly informative at the genus level and aid in determining the monophyly and composition of heroine genera. Upon acceptance of all putative genera, as recovered in this study, the Heroini would be with 35 genera the most genus-rich clade of Neotropical cichlids.
Click to expand...

Trust me when I say that grammodes and dovii are definitely two different species.
 
I have a recent scientific article that indicates that grammodes and dovii are not that similar genetically. Grammodes seem to be closer related to herichthyines (texas, labridens, bartoni), salvini) and dovii and other Parachromis species are in a group called amphilophines (istlanum is in this group too). I know it doesn't seem that way based on how these fish look, but the genetics indicate lineages that often don't match phenotypic appearances. Dovii and grammodes may look similar due to convergent evolution or some similar factor, and they are related because they are Central American cichlids, but that is as close as it gets.

I suspect that beani, grammodes, and istlanum will each eventually get their own genus name. Although cichlidae groups them together in the aforementioned article, it was based on behavioral, ecological, and phenotypical traits they share.

This guy did the work.
http://golab.unl.edu/projects/Cichlidae/

I can't find a free link to the paper, but here it is if you want to purchase.
.http://www.sciencedirect.com/scienc...serid=10&md5=327a44ab69738d666dc0b632f4e43604
 
The pictures you took are fascinating. Is it possible that the grammodes is a hybrid? It looks so similar to that Dovii. Also, according to Jeff Rapps and his website grammodes is considered a guapote.
 
darthodo;2272876; said:
I have a recent scientific article that indicates that grammodes and dovii are not that similar genetically. Grammodes seem to be closer related to herichthyines (texas, labridens, bartoni), salvini) and dovii and other Parachromis species are in a group called amphilophines (istlanum is in this group too). I know it doesn't seem that way based on how these fish look, but the genetics indicate lineages that often don't match phenotypic appearances. Dovii and grammodes may look similar due to convergent evolution or some similar factor, and they are related because they are Central American cichlids, but that is as close as it gets.

I suspect that beani, grammodes, and istlanum will each eventually get their own genus name. Although cichlidae groups them together in the aforementioned article, it was based on behavioral, ecological, and phenotypical traits they share.

This guy did the work.
http://golab.unl.edu/projects/Cichlidae/

I can't find a free link to the paper, but here it is if you want to purchase.
.http://www.sciencedirect.com/scienc...serid=10&md5=327a44ab69738d666dc0b632f4e43604
Click to expand...


Good post. Here's the link to the abstract I quoted, it took all the data from the journal you posted then added in more stuff, basically an updated version.

http://www.sciencedirect.com/scienc...serid=10&md5=14acd143ff90226d24f2ed6220d7d919

I used to have the older 2006 one on .pdf, but I think I lost it when I reformatted my computer...

EDIT: My college scientific journal privileges expired on the 30th...crappy.
 
It is worth noting that common names mean nothing in taxonomic discussion. One should notice that there is no genus "guapote". Also, grammode being called mini dovii is meaningless as well. I have heard istlanum called mini umbie, but it is obviously not Caquetia.
 
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