Classification / Names Common names | Synonyms | Catalog of Fishes (gen., sp.) | ITIS | CoL | WoRMS | Cloffa

Actinopterygii (ray-finned fishes) > Osteoglossiformes (Bony tongues) > Mormyridae (Elephantfishes)
Etymology: Petrocephalus: Latin, petra = stone + Greek, kephale = head (Ref. 45335).

Environment / Climate / Range Ecology

Freshwater; demersal; potamodromous (Ref. 51243). Tropical; 23°C - 26°C (Ref. 2060)

Length at first maturity / Size / Weight / Age

Maturity: L_m 6.8 range ? - ? cm
Max length : 11.0 cm SL male/unsexed; (Ref. 383); max. published weight: 10 g (Ref. 3799); max. reported age: 3 years (Ref. 2749)

Short description Morphology | Morphometrics

Dorsal spines (total): 0; Dorsal soft rays (total): 21-28; Anal spines: 0; Anal soft rays: 27 - 35. body depth 2.9-3.7 x SL, anal base 3.2-4.7 x SL, caudal peduncle height 13.3-19.3 x SL. Eye diameter 2.7-4.6 x head length. Uniformly brilliant silver color, sometimes grayish or brownish.

Distribution Countries | FAO areas | Ecosystems | Occurrences | Introductions | Faunafri

Africa: Chad, Niger, Volta, Gambia and Senegal basins, including the Nile. Also known from Côte d'Ivoire (Ref. 272).

Affinities: P. pellegrini. Generates electric organ discharge (EOD) of short duration that seems to correlate with aggregative behavior of the species (Ref. 14060; 10601). EOD temporal pattern cues have been shown to play a role in species recognition for P. bovei (Ref. 10600). A ratio measure between olfactory and visual receptor areas suggests that this species relies more on visual than olfactory information (Ref. 10839). A fractional spawner (Ref. 10605; 10606).

Main reference Upload your references | References | Coordinator | Collaborators

Gosse, J.-P., 1984. Mormyridae. p. 63-122. In J. Daget, J.-P. Gosse and D.F.E. Thys van den Audenaerde (eds.) Check-list of the freshwater fishes of Africa (CLOFFA). ORSTOM, Paris and MRAC, Tervuren. Vol. 1.

IUCN Red List Status (Ref. 90363)

Not Evaluated

Threat to humans

Harmless

Human uses

Fisheries: of no interest

FAO(Publication : search) | FisheriesWiki | Sea Around Us

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Estimates of some properties based on empirical models

Phylogenetic diversity index (Ref. 82805): PD₅₀ = 0.5000 [Uniqueness, from 0.5 = low to 2.0 = high].

Bayesian length-weight: a=0.01674 (-0.05408 - 0.08757), b=2.84 (2.81 - 2.87), based on LWR estimates for this species (Ref. 93245).

Trophic Level (Ref. 69278): 3.1 ±0.4 se; Based on diet studies.

Resilience (Ref. 69278): High, minimum population doubling time less than 15 months (K=0.53-1.10; tmax=2.5).

Vulnerability (Ref. 59153): Low vulnerability (13 of 100) .

Price category (Ref. 80766): Unknown.

Petrocephalus bovei bovei (Valenciennes, 1847)