Annotated list of freshwater fishes of the Limoncocha Lagoon, Napo river basin, northern Amazon region of Ecuador

Abstract

An annotated list of the freshwater fishes of the Limoncocha Lagoon, in the Limoncocha Biological Reserve in the northern Amazon region of Ecuador is presented. Fishes were captured between March and July of 2012, and we combined these results with previous studies to provide a comprehensive list of fishes in the Limoncocha Biological Reserve. Thirty-three species belonging to 14 families distributed in 7 orders were collected. The most representative orders in number of species and specimens were Characiformes, Siluriformes, and Perciformes, respectively, being Characiformes as the most important in terms of richness and abundance of species. Characidae (Characiformes) exhibited the greatest abundance and broadest distribution in our samples. A short morphological description and morphometric measurements of each species are also presented.