CORE Metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk Provided by Ghent University Academic Bibliography 21/06/2011 - 10:33:20 Evolutionary morphology of trichomycterid catfishes: about hanging on and digging in Dominique Adriaens1, Jonathan N. Baskin2 & Hendrik Coppens1 1 Evolutionary Morphology of Vertebrates, Ghent University, K.L. Ledeganckstraat 35, B-9000 Gent, Belgium (
[email protected]); 2 Biological Sciences Department, California State Polytechnic University Pomona, 3801 West Temple Avenue, Pomona, CA 91768, U.S.A (
[email protected]) Number of pages: 39 Number of figures: 10 Number of tables: 0 Running title: Trichomycterid evolutionary morphology Key words: evolutionary morphology, Trichomycteridae, opercular system, Vandelliinae, Glanapteryginae, body elongation, fossorial Corresponding author: Dominique Adriaens Evolutionary Morphology of Vertebrates, Ghent University K.L. Ledeganckstraat 35, B-9000 Gent, Belgium
[email protected] 1 21/06/2011 - 10:33:20 Abstract The catfishes (Siluriformes) comprise a particularly diverse teleost clade, from a taxonomic, morphological, biogeographical, ecological and behavioural perspective. The Neotropical Trichomycteridae (the “parasitic” catfishes) are emblematic of this diversity, including fishes with some of the most specialized habits and habitats among teleosts (e.g. hematophagy, lepidophagy, miniaturization, fossorial habitats, altitudinal extremes). Relatively little information is available on general trichomycterid morphology, as most work so far has concentrated on phylogenetically informative characters, with little concern about general descriptive anatomy. In this paper we provide a synthesis of new and previously-available data in order to build a general picture of basal crown group trichomycterid morphology and of its main modifications. We focus on the evolutionary morphology in two relatively distal trichomycterid lineages, i.e.