Research

Publications
Title: Gobiobotia lii, a new species of gudgeon (Teleostei, Gobionidae) from the middle Chang-Jiang Basin, central China, with notes on the validity of G. nicholsi Banarescu & Nalbant, 1966
First author: Chen, Xiao; Wang, Man; Cao, Liang; Zhang, E.
Journal: ZOOSYSTEMATICS AND EVOLUTION
Years: 2022
Volume / issue: /
DOI: 10.3897/zse.98.80547
Abstract: Gobiobotia lii is described from the Qi-Shui, a stream tributary on the northern bank of the middle Chang-Jiang mainstem in Hubei Province and Lake Dongting in Hunan Province, central China. The new species is distinguished from all other congeneric species by possessing a combination of the following characters: a naked region of the abdomen adjacent to the ventral mid-line extending to the vent and the vertebral count (4+31-32). The validity of G. lii is confirmed by its monophyletic nature recovered in a phylogenetic analysis, based on the cyt b gene and its significant sequence divergence with sampled congeneric species. Critical notes were given on the species recognition of historically documented eight-barbel gudgeons co-existing in Lake Dongting. Gobiobotia nicholsi Banarescu & Nalbant, 1966 should be a valid species distinct from G. filifer (Garman, 1912) and both G. pappenheimi Kreyenberg, 1911 and G. boulengeri (=Xenophysogobio boulengeri (Tchang, 1929)) have an erroneous record from the Lake.