A new catfish: Oreoglanis hponkanensis

The fish family Sisoridae belongs to the catfishes. These exclusively Asian catfishes live in fast-moving waters and often have adaptations that allow them to adhere to objects in their habitats, e.g. a thoracic adhesive apparatus or plaited paired fins.

The new species was found during a survey at the Hponkanrazi Wildlife Sanctuary in Myanmar. The authors named the species after the sanctuary.

For the experts: During a survey of the Mali Hka River drainage in Hponkanrazi Wildlife Sanctuary in December 2015, a new species was collected and is described herein as Oreoglanis hponkanensis. It is a member of the O. siamensis species group and can be distinguished from its congeners in having a unique combination of the following characters: lower lip with median notch and posterior margin entire, caudal fin emarginate, nasal barbel reaching about half the distance to eye, tip of maxillary barbel rounded, posterior margin of maxillary barbel entire, absence of pale elliptical patches on sides of body below adipose fin, absence of patch on base of first dorsal fin ray, caudal fin brown with two round, bright orange patches in middle, branched dorsal fin rays 5, branched anal fin rays 2, vertebrae 40, pectoral fin surpassing pelvic fin origin, pelvic fin length 21–26% SL, caudal peduncle length 25–33% SL, caudal peduncle depth 3–5% SL, adipose fin base length 34–39% SL, and dorsal to adipose distance 12–16% SL.