The Curimatidae, toothless characins, are a

family Family (from ) is a Social group, group of people related either by consanguinity (by recognized birth) or Affinity (law), affinity (by marriage or other relationship). It forms the basis for social order. Ideally, families offer predictabili ...

of freshwater fishes, of the

order Order, ORDER or Orders may refer to: * A socio-political or established or existing order, e.g. World order, Ancien Regime, Pax Britannica * Categorization, the process in which ideas and objects are recognized, differentiated, and understood ...

Characiformes Characiformes is an order of ray-finned fish, comprising the characins and their allies. Grouped in 18 recognized families, more than 2000 different species are described, including the well-known piranha and tetras.; Buckup P.A.: "Relationsh ...

. They originate from southern

Costa Rica Costa Rica, officially the Republic of Costa Rica, is a country in Central America. It borders Nicaragua to the north, the Caribbean Sea to the northeast, Panama to the southeast, and the Pacific Ocean to the southwest, as well as Maritime bo ...

to northern

Argentina Argentina, officially the Argentine Republic, is a country in the southern half of South America. It covers an area of , making it the List of South American countries by area, second-largest country in South America after Brazil, the fourt ...

. The family has around 105

species A species () is often defined as the largest group of organisms in which any two individuals of the appropriate sexes or mating types can produce fertile offspring, typically by sexual reproduction. It is the basic unit of Taxonomy (biology), ...

, many of them frequently exploited for human consumption. They are closely related to the

Prochilodontidae The Prochilodontidae, or flannel-mouthed characins, are a small family of freshwater fishes found primarily in the northern half of South America, south to Paraguay and northern Argentina. This family is closely related to the Curimatidae, and in ...

. This family lacks jaw teeth, although they do sometimes have small teeth on their pharyngeal plates. They eat films of slime coating underwater surfaces, which consist largely of

algae Algae ( , ; : alga ) is an informal term for any organisms of a large and diverse group of photosynthesis, photosynthetic organisms that are not plants, and includes species from multiple distinct clades. Such organisms range from unicellular ...

zooplankton Zooplankton are the heterotrophic component of the planktonic community (the " zoo-" prefix comes from ), having to consume other organisms to thrive. Plankton are aquatic organisms that are unable to swim effectively against currents. Consequent ...

and

detritus In biology, detritus ( or ) is organic matter made up of the decomposition, decomposing remains of organisms and plants, and also of feces. Detritus usually hosts communities of microorganisms that colonize and decomposition, decompose (Reminera ...

. It has been suggested that feeding behavior of some species like '' Psectrogaster essequibensis'' may change its diet pattern in function of the sediment content of the water, showing a regime mainly based on

in waters with high sediment load, until an omnivorous or detritivore regime in waters with low sediment load.

Classification

The family has eight

genera Genus (; : genera ) is a taxonomic rank above species and below family as used in the biological classification of living and fossil organisms as well as viruses. In binomial nomenclature, the genus name forms the first part of the binomial s ...

and around 105 species: Family Curimatidae * '' Curimata''

Bosc Bosc may refer to: * Bosc pear, a cultivar of the European Pear * Bioinformatics Open Source Conference (BOSC), an academic conference * Gobiosoma bosc, a fish of family Gobiidae People * Louis Augustin Guillaume Bosc (1759–1828), French bota ...

, 1817 (13 species) * '' Curimatella'' C. H. Eigenmann & R. S. Eigenmann, 1889 (five species) * '' Curimatopsis''

Steindachner Franz Steindachner (11 November 1834 in Vienna – 10 December 1919 in Vienna) was an Austrian zoologist, ichthyologist, and herpetologist. He published over 200 papers on fishes and over 50 papers on reptiles and amphibians. Steindachner descri ...

, 1876 (nine species) * '' Cyphocharax'' Fowler, 1906 (38 species) * '' Potamorhina''

Cope A cope ( ("rain coat") or ("cape")) is a liturgical long mantle or cloak, open at the front and fastened at the breast with a band or clasp. It may be of any liturgical colour. A cope may be worn by any rank of the Catholic or Anglican clerg ...

, 1878 (five species) * '' Psectogaster'' C. H. Eigenmann & R. S. Eigenmann, 1889 (eight species) * '' Pseudocurimata'' Fernández-Yépez, 1948 (six species) * '' Steindachnerina'' Fowler, 1906 (23 species) In addition, one fossil genus is known in †'' Plesiocurimata'' Figueiredo & Costa-Carvalho, 1999 from the

Oligocene The Oligocene ( ) is a geologic epoch (geology), epoch of the Paleogene Geologic time scale, Period that extends from about 33.9 million to 23 million years before the present ( to ). As with other older geologic periods, the rock beds that defin ...

-aged

Tremembé Formation Tremembé is a municipality in the state of São Paulo in Brazil. It is part of the Metropolitan Region of Vale do Paraíba e Litoral Norte. The population is 47,714 (2020 est.) in an area of 191.09 km². The elevation is 560 m. A s ...

of Brazil''.''

References

* Nelson, Joseph S. (2006). ''

Fishes of the World ''Fishes of the World'' is a standard reference for the systematics of fishes. It was first written in 1976 by the American ichthyologist Joseph S. Nelson (1937–2011). Now in its fifth edition (2016), the work is a comprehensive overview of t ...

''. John Wiley & Sons, Inc. Fish of South America Characiformes families {{Characiformes-stub

Classification

See also

References