A new species of mastacembelid eel has been described in the journal Ichthyological Exploration of Freshwaters.
Emmanuel Wreven of the Africa Museum, Tervuren, Belgium has named the new fish Aethiomastacembelus shiloangoensis, after its collection locality in the Shiloanga River basin in the Democratic Republic of Congo.
The fish was originally found by Travers in a study undertaken in 1987 during an analysis of mastacembelids caught in the Shiloanga, but he didn't describe the fish. Wreven did further biometric and morphological analyses on Travers' new eel and found that it was distinct from other members of the Mastacembelidae.
Wreven says the fish can be distinguished from the other African spiny eels by a number of characters, including its lack of preopercular and preorbital spines; 24-26+1 dorsal spines and its colour pattern which consists of a series of dark blotches on the top half of the body and fins.
For more details see: Vreven, E. (2004) - Aethiomastacembelus shiloangoensis, a new spiny eel from the Shiloanga River basin (Synbranchiformes: Mastacembelidae). Ichthyological Exploration of Freshwaters. Vol. 15. No. 2.