4 replies to this topic

[fluttermoth]

Does anyone know a way to tell blackwing and common hatchets apart?

I bought six today that had come in as marbleds, which obviously aren't, but I can't decide which species they are. The man in the shop (who is usually pretty good) said they weren't commons, but I take everything I hear in LFS with a large pinch of salt

They have a bright copper coloured stripe from gill to tail and a bright copper eye. They're silver with scattered black scales on the chest, and the 'keel stripe' splits under the chin and runs up to the eye.

I've tried taking pics but they're too small and my phone camera is too rubbish

[MBOU]

Sounds like the commons or silvers to me, the ones i have seen as blackwing or black stripe hatchets generally did have more black on them and not the speckles that the commons have.

Cant remember the species names... hmmm

Jeez, they really are all misidentified arent they! What *i* knew as 'commons' and i forget their scientific names were all speckles and no stripes!

Blackwings have the black stripe down their body...Carnegiella marthae

http://www.google.co.uk/search?hl=en&q=blackwing+hatchetfish&bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.r_qf.,cf.osb&biw=1057&bih=635&wrapid=tlif134271858477810&um=1&ie=UTF-8&tbm=isch&source=og&sa=N&tab=wi&ei=fUIIUIS0NorD0QWz4Oz3BA

Common Hatchets (as i know them!) I believe on the import lists they are listed as Gasteropelecus levis
http://www.google.co.uk/imgres?q=common+hatchetfish&um=1&hl=en&sa=X&biw=1057&bih=635&tbm=isch&tbnid=zy3_nbWp1s5S1M:&imgrefurl=http://www.aqua-fish.net/show.php%3Fh%3Dcommonhatchetfish&docid=pPqpTfFKQyC-3M&imgurl=http://www.aqua-fish.net/imgs/fish/common-hatchetfish-2.jpg&w=450&h=300&ei=wkIIULaDBYi40QXP_tjTBA&zoom=1


I hate to say it but only decent info is on Wiki lol. They dont have images but you can google the names, the trouble is you'll have the same bloomin problem in that no one really has a clue what species they have!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freshwater_hatchetfish

[fluttermoth]

Thanks, MBOU.

I have been trawling through image searches myself with pretty much the same result as you; it's all terribly confusing!

I'm fairly sure they're blackwings Carnegiella marthae, just not 100%!

I certainly don't remember commons/silvers as having the 'keel stripe' up to the eye, or such a bright copper lateral stripe (which on these ones is as bright as it is on the marbleds) but I haven't kept them for a few years now, and of course they had none in my LFS to compare them to today

[MBOU]

The trouble is... that isnt even reliable, the suppliers keep misidentifying the species too... the retailers have no choice but to lable up their fish as what they come in as unless by some miracle, the retailer happens to know 100% what the fish really is.

[fluttermoth]

Very true, and makes things quite difficult *sighs*