Sympatry and syntopy of cichlids (Teleostei: Cichlidae) in the Selva Central, upper Ucayali river basin, Peru

Abstract

Sympatry and syntopy are rare among congeneric cichlids in the Neotropics. Among Peruvian Amazonian cichlids congeneric syntopy has so far been reported in only 1 case known from a single locality. Based on thorough exploration of a new locality I refute the syntopy of the 2 species involved: Bujurquina robusta (Kullander, 1986) is a mouth-bay species while B. labiosa (Kullander, 1986) is an upland species. I demonstrate the generality of this ecological allotopy with further examples from a second study area including a different set of species.