Astyanax bimaculatus (Linnaeus, 1758)

Mirande, Juan Marcos & Several, Stefan Koerber Abstract, 2015, On some species of Astyanax reported erroneously from Argentina., Ichthyological Contributions of PecesCriollos 35, pp. 1-8 : 1-2

Astyanax bimaculatus (Linnaeus, 1758)

original Salmo bimaculatus

type locality America Meridionali

synonyms Tetragonopterus maculatus Müller & Troschel, 1845 | Brasilia, Guiana et Surinam

? Tetragonopterus gronovii Valenciennes, 1850 | Surinam; rivières de La Guyane

? Tetragonopterus linnaei Valenciennes, 1850 | Cayenne [ French Guiana]

? Tetragonopterus wappi Valenciennes, 1850 | [ Essequibo River, Guyana]

? Tetragonopterus vittatus Castelnau, 1855 | Bahia [ Brazil]

? Poecilurichthys brevoortii Gill, 1858 | [ Island of] Trinidad]

Tetragonopterus bartlettii Günther, 1866 | Upper Amazon

? Tetragonopterus orientalis Cope, 1870 | Pará [ Brazil]

? Tetragonopterus bahiensis Steindachner, 1877 | Bahia, Brazil

Astyanax bimaculatus borealis Eigenmann, 1908 | Rio Magdalena and Cauca Astyanax bimaculatus novae Eigenmann, 1911 | Rio Sapon, Prazeres, Bahia [ Brazil] Astyanax rupununi Fowler, 1914 | Rupununi River , British Guiana

Astyanax bimaculatus incaicus Tortonese, 1942 | Rio Zamora, Ecuador

Ringuelet et al. (1967) and López et al. (2003) mentioned as first record for Argentina ‘Cuvier & Valenciennes (1848) sub Tetragonopterus orbygnianus , in part’. Astyanax orbignyanus (Valenciennes, 1850) was described from La Plata and other localities in Argentina and is currently considered to be a valid species by Buckup (2003). The type material of A. orbignyanus is still available in Paris ( Bertin 1948) and since the times of Eigenmann probably nobody has examined these specimens.

Eigenmann (1921) treated A. orbignyanus as a synonym of two different congeners and assigned part of the type material to Astyanax abramis and part to A. bimaculatus [the nominal subspecies]. Pozzi (1945), Ringuelet & Arámburu (1962), Ringuelet et al. (1967), López et al. (1987) and López et al. (2003) followed Eigenmann (1921) or copied from each other and thus initiated the ongoing erroneous listings of Astyanax bimaculatus as a species from Argentina. In the same paper Eigenmann (1921) described the new subspecies Astyanax bimaculatus paraguayensis , raising automatically A. bimaculatus to the rank of the subspecies A. b. bimaculatus . This new subspecies was listed by Pozzi (1945), Ringuelet et al. (1967), and López et al. (1987). As Astyanax bimaculatus paraguayensis was preoccupied in Astyanax by Bertoniolus paraguayensis Fowler, 1918 a replacement name was proposed by Géry (1972): Astyanax bimaculatus asuncionensis .

López et al. (2003) did not mentioned Astyanax bimaculatus paraguayensis , Astyanax bimaculatus asuncionensis or Astyanax asuncionensis . Since then, Astyanax asuncionensis Géry, 1972 was treated as a valid species from Argentina by Azpelicueta et al. (2003), Casciotta et al. (2003), Mirande et al. (2004), Miquelarena & Menni (2005), Miquelarena et al. (2005), Mirande et al. (2006), Mirande et al. (2007), Almirón et al. (2010), Mirande (2010), and Soneira et al. (2010). Miquelarena & Menni (2005) did not include A. bimaculatus in their key to the Astyanax from Argentina. The first record for Uruguay was done by Messner (1962) sub A. b. bimaculatus . Nion et al. (2002) listed A. bimaculatus . Serra (2012) has excluded A. bimaculatus from the faunal list of Uruguay. Also, Buckup (2003) mentioned the distribution of A. bimaculatus as “ Panama to Amazon basin”. Astyanax asuncionensis is readily distinguished from A. bimaculatus by the absence of maxillary teeth (vs. presence). We assume that most of the Argentinean records of Astyanax bimaculatus can be assigned to Astyanax asuncionensis Géry, 1972 .