Journal of the Royal Society of New Zealand abstracts

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Two further new species of Galaxias (Teleostei: Galaxiidae) from the Taieri River, southern New Zealand

R. M. McDowall*

Two new species of Galaxias have overlapping distributions in the lower Taieri River catchment, Otago, although not as yet found in sympatry. Galaxias pullus n.sp. is known from several tributaries of the Waipori River up- and downstream of Lake Mahinerangi, and also from a tributary of the Waitahuna, part of the Clutha River catchment. Galaxias eldoni n.sp. comes from several small tributaries of the lower Taieri near Outram and Middlemarch, from a tributary of the Waipori River below Lake Mahinerangi, from a tributary of the lake, and also a west branch tributary of the Tokomairiro River. These new species belong within the Galaxias vulgaris species-group, which otherwise includes the nominate species, G. anomalus and G. depressiceps. Most populations of this species-group south of the Waitaki River are not G. vulgaris (sensu stricto), but belong to one of four other species now recognised from the region. The known distributions probably reflect a combination of incomplete knowledge and fragmentation of ranges resulting from the effects of introduced species.

Keywords: New Zealand, Galaxias pullus, Galaxias eldoni, new species, taxonomy, Taieri River

(c) Journal of The Royal Society of New Zealand,

Volume 27, Number 2, June 1997, pp 199-217

PDF file of entire paper: medium quality (1457K); (scanned from paper original: notes about this process)

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