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Nathan Lujan (3)

Description: Dorsal soft rays (total): 8-9; Anal soft rays: 1 - 3; Vertebrae: 28 - 29. Habitat: Found in high gradient stream and rapids, over mostly boulder substrate. Aquarium Care: Will need a good water flow in the aquarium with a sand substrate and plenty of hiding places. The Chaetostoma species are not the easiest to maintain as the mountain stream species will need a water current to provide oxygen-rich water. The species that are exported usually originate from warmer waters so are a bit easier to keep than the mountain stream variety. Diet: Great algae eater, but you will have to subsidise this food with algae wafers and vegetable foods such as cucumber, zucchini and lettuce. Will also except tablet and worm foods. Sexual differences: Males have better colour, a broader head and lips and adult males possess longer ventral fins than the females. Etymology: The specific epithet spondylus is in reference to the tuft of odontodes on the trunk lateral dermal plates that resemble the thorny projections of the bivalve mollusk known as spiny oyster.

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Loricariidae

South America: Río Chotano, río Huancabamba, río Sendamal, and río Utcubamba, mountain tributaries (1500- 2000 m above sea level) of río Marañón, Amazon River basin in Peru. 

13.0cm. (5¼ins)

23-27°c (73-80°f.)

6.0-7.0.

Froese, R. and D. Pauly. Editors. 2019. FishBase. World Wide Web electronic publication. www.fishbase.org, ( 04/2019 ).
Salcedo, N.J. and H. Ortega, 2015. A new species of Chaetostoma, an armored catfish (Siluriformes: Loricariidae), from the río Marañón drainage, Amazon basin, Peru. Neotrop. Ichthyol. 13(1):151-156.