Pseudopimelodidae is a small family of catfish

Catfish

Catfishes are a diverse group of ray-finned fish. Named for their prominent barbels, which resemble a cat's whiskers, catfish range in size and behavior from the heaviest and longest, the Mekong giant catfish from Southeast Asia and the second longest, the wels catfish of Eurasia, to detritivores...

es. Some of these fish are popular aquarium fish.

Taxonomy

This family was formerly a subfamily of Pimelodidae

Pimelodidae

Pimelodidae, commonly known as the long-whiskered catfishes, is a family of catfishes .-Taxonomy:Pimelodidae has undergone much revision. Currently, the family contains about 30 genera and about 90 recognized and known but unnamed species...

. Pseudopimelodidae is a monophyletic

Monophyly

In common cladistic usage, a monophyletic group is a taxon which forms a clade, meaning that it contains all the descendants of the possibly hypothetical closest common ancestor of the members of the group. The term is synonymous with the uncommon term holophyly...

 group. Previously, the superfamily Pseudopimelodoidea is sister to superfamilies Sisoroidea

Sisoroidea

Sisoroidea is a superfamily of catfishes . It contains the four families Amblycipitidae, Akysidae, Sisoridae, and Erethistidae; many sources also include Aspredinidae. With Aspredinidae, this superfamily includes about 42 genera and 230 species.-Taxonomy:Sisoroidea is sister to the Loricarioidea...

 + Loricarioidea

Loricarioidea

Loricarioidea is a superfamily of catfishes . It contains the six families Trichomycteridae, Nematogenyiidae, Callichthyidae, Scoloplacidae, Astroblepidae, and Loricariidae. Some schemes also include Amphiliidae...

. However, some evidence has shown that this family, along with Pimelodidae, Heptapteridae

Heptapteridae

Heptapteridae is a family of catfish that originate from Mexico to South America. Heptapteridae is derived from Greek, hepta meaning seven and pteron meaning fin....

, and Conorhynchos, may form a monophyletic assemblage, which contradicts the hypothesis that the former family Pimelodidae that included these families is a polyphyletic

Polyphyly

A polyphyletic group is one whose members' last common ancestor is not a member of the group.For example, the group consisting of warm-blooded animals is polyphyletic, because it contains both mammals and birds, but the most recent common ancestor of mammals and birds was cold-blooded...

 group.

Distribution

Pseudopimelodidae is restricted to freshwater in South America

South America

South America is a continent situated in the Western Hemisphere, mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a relatively small portion in the Northern Hemisphere. The continent is also considered a subcontinent of the Americas. It is bordered on the west by the Pacific Ocean and on the north and east...

. These catfish are found from the Atrato River

Atrato River

The Río Atrato is a river of northwestern Colombia. It rises in the slopes of the Western Cordillera and flows almost due north to the Gulf of Urabá , where it forms a large, swampy delta....

 in Colombia

Colombia

Colombia, officially the Republic of Colombia , is a unitary constitutional republic comprising thirty-two departments. The country is located in northwestern South America, bordered to the east by Venezuela and Brazil; to the south by Ecuador and Peru; to the north by the Caribbean Sea; to the...

 to Argentina

Argentina

Argentina , officially the Argentine Republic , is the second largest country in South America by land area, after Brazil. It is constituted as a federation of 23 provinces and an autonomous city, Buenos Aires...

 in the Río de la Plata

Río de la Plata

The Río de la Plata —sometimes rendered River Plate in British English and the Commonwealth, and occasionally rendered [La] Plata River in other English-speaking countries—is the river and estuary formed by the confluence of the Uruguay River and the Paraná River on the border between Argentina and...

.

Description

These catfishes have wide mouths, small eyes, and short barbels. Their bold markings lead them to be commonly known as bumblebee catfishes or dwarf marbled catfishes. B. acanthochiroides grows to 80.0 centimetre

Centimetre

A centimetre is a unit of length in the metric system, equal to one hundredth of a metre, which is the SI base unit of length. Centi is the SI prefix for a factor of . Hence a centimetre can be written as or — meaning or respectively...

s (31 in

Inch

An inch is the name of a unit of length in a number of different systems, including Imperial units, and United States customary units. There are 36 inches in a yard and 12 inches in a foot...

) TL

Fish measurement

Fish measurement refers to the measuring of the length of individual fish and of various parts of their anatomy. These data are used in many areas of ichthyology, including taxonomy and fisheries biology.-Overall length:...

. However, most species are smaller; species of the genus Microglanis

Microglanis

Microglanis is a genus of catfishes belonging to the family Pseudopimelodidae.-Taxonomy:Microglanis was described in 1912 by Carl H. Eigenmann.This genus is considered monophyletic by a number of autapomorphies....

rarely exceed 70 millimetre

Millimetre

The millimetre is a unit of length in the metric system, equal to one thousandth of a metre, which is the SI base unit of length....

s (2.8 in

Inch

An inch is the name of a unit of length in a number of different systems, including Imperial units, and United States customary units. There are 36 inches in a yard and 12 inches in a foot...

) SL

Fish measurement

Fish measurement refers to the measuring of the length of individual fish and of various parts of their anatomy. These data are used in many areas of ichthyology, including taxonomy and fisheries biology.-Overall length:...

and are never over 80 mm (3.1 in) SL.