Chinese scientists have described a new species of labeonine cyprinid and placed it in a new genus by itself.
Wei-Xian Li, Jing-Cheng Ran and Hui-Ming Chen named the new fish Longanalus macrochirous in a paper in the latest volume of the Journal of Zhanjiang Ocean University.
The fish, which is a member of the cyprinid subfamily Labeoninae, was discovered in a cave in the Maolan National Reserve, Libo County, Guizhou, China. The type specimen measures around 9.3cm.
The authors said that the new fish can be diagnosed by the following combination of characters: "D ii, 8; A, ii, 7; P, ii, 13; V, i, 8; Branched caudal fin rays 15; Lateral line scales 50. Body length is 4.04 times as long as body height, 4.90 times as head length, 4.90 times as length of caudal peduncle, and 7.15 times as height of caudal peduncle.
"Head length is 3.17 times as long as snout, 4.75 time as diameter of eye, 2.11 time as width of interorbital; height of caudal peduncle is 1.46 times as long as length of it."
For more information see the paper: Wei-Xian Li;Jing-Cheng Ran;Hui-Ming Chen (2006) - A New Genus and Species of Labeoninae from Guizhou, China. Journal of Zhanjiang Ocean University 26(3).