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Characiformes

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Characiformes

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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. Characins are most diverse in the Neotropics, where they are found in lakes and rivers throughout most of South and Central America. At least 209 species of characins are found in Africa, including the distichodontids, citharinids, alestids, and hepsetids. The rest of the characins originate in the Americas.

OverviewAI-generated

Characiformes is an accepted order within the class Teleostei and phylum Chordata. It belongs to the kingdom Animalia. The group is commonly referred to as karperzalmachtigen.

Specimens associated with this order have been recorded in marine and freshwater habitats. Occurrence data from institutions such as CAS includes records from Peru, Brazil, Colombia, and the Philippines.

Synthesized by Vinony from 24 facts across 7 sources: Wikidata, GBIF, PubMed, Gbif Occ, WoRMS, iDigBio, Vinony graph. Generated from structured data (not the Wikipedia text) and checked against those facts — may still contain errors.

Species

karperzalmachtigen

Characiformes

ORDER

  1. KingdomAnimalia
  2. PhylumChordata
  3. ClassTeleostei
  4. OrderCharaciformes
Habitatmarine, freshwater
Observations recorded1,056,948

via GBIF

Museum specimens

Specimen records
733
With media
10
Collections
CAS
Recorded in
Peru, Brazil, Colombia, Philippines

~10 min read

Encyclopedic overview

6 sections
Contents
  • Description
  • Taxonomy
  • Evolution
  • Fossil taxa
  • Phylogeny
  • References

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. Characins are most diverse in the Neotropics, where they are found in lakes and rivers throughout most of South and Central America. At least 209 species of characins are found in Africa, including the distichodontids, citharinids, alestids, and hepsetids. The rest of the characins originate in the Americas.

A few characins become quite large, and are important as food or game. Most, however, are small shoaling fish (or forage fish). Many species commonly called tetras are popular in aquaria because of their bright colors, general hardiness, and tolerance towards other fish in community tanks.

Excerpted from Wikipedia’s “Characiformes” article, available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.

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