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Ben Lee (2) Mostafa Hossain (3) Andrew Rao (2)

Description: Dorsal spines (total): 2; Dorsal soft rays (total): 7; Anal soft rays: 12 - 13; Vertebrae: 44 - 45. Distinguished from its congeners by the following unique combination of characters: head length 32.7-33.5% SL, head depth 14.2-15.3% SL, depth of caudal peduncle 7.5-8.8% SL, eye diameter 11.9-12.3% HL, a pattern of dark dots arranged in vertical columns on the sides of the body, a convex snout and a broad, shallowly incised humeral process. Habitat: Hemibagrus menoda was described from the Kosi, Mahanadi and other rivers in the north of Bihar and Bengal, India (Hamilton 1822), with a neotype from the Surma (Meghna) River drainage in Bangladesh being designated by Ng and Ferraris (2000). Inhabits rivers and ponds in plains and submontane regions. It is usually dug out from the bottom of ponds where they lie buried in soft, wet clay. Aquarium Care: As with most of the genus, H. menoda can become a pretty nasty character in your fish tanks and if housed with other fish can be lethal. Cichlids such as the Pikes from the Crenichla genus that can look after themselves would be the best bet for other tankmates. If kept with other fish they will have to be able to look after themselves. Diet: Whilst this catfish is best described as a predator/carnivore in its natural habitat feedings of fish, insects, shrimps and other crustaceans, in captivity this catfish will feed on mussels, prawns, pieces of fish, earthworms and will even take prepared foods such as catfish pellets. Etymology: The genus name Hemibagrus: Hemi- half; bagrus- from 'bagre', a South American name for a catfish, but is only used for African and Asian species. The specific name menoda: local name for this species in Bangladesh. Remarks: This species is often referred to Mystus in the literature, and has sometimes been erroneously listed as Mystus corsula (due to the erroneous labelling of the figure accompanying the original description as "Mugil corsula").

Menoda catfish

Pimelodus menoda, Bagrus corsula, Bagrus trachacanthus, Macrones corsula, Aoria corsula, Mystus menoda, Mystus menoda trachacanthus, Mystus trachacanthus

Bagridae

Asia: Ganges, Brahmaputra, Mahanadi and Godavari river drainages in Bangladesh and northern India. Reported from Nepal. Type locality: Kosi, Mahananda, and other rivers in north of Behar and Bengal [now: Bangladesh, Suarma (Meghna) drainage, Sharighat bazaar, 22 miles NE of Sylhet on SylhetShillong hwy, by neotype designation.

40.0cm. (16ins)

22-28°C (71-83°F)

6.5-7.2.

Ferraris, C.J. Jr., 2007. Checklist of catfishes, recent and fossil (Osteichthyes: Siluriformes), and catalogue of siluriform primary types. Zootaxa 1418:1-628.
Froese, R. and D. Pauly. Editors. 2016. FishBase. World Wide Web electronic publication. www.fishbase.org, ( 10/2016 ).
Ng, H.H. 2010. Hemibagrus menoda. The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species 2010.
Ng, H.H. and C.J. Ferraris Jr., 2000. A review of the genus Hemibagrus in Southern Asia, with descriptions of two new species. Proc. Cal. Acad. Sci. 52(11):125-142.
The ETYFish Project Fish Name Etymology Database © Christopher Scharpf.