Burchell's Redfin

The minnow

Burchell's Redfin is a minnow in the family Cyprinidae (order Cypriniformes) — Pseudobarbus burchelli.

Range and habitat

The Berg River redfin (P. Burgi) is a very close relative. It is endemic to the Western Cape Province of South Africa, where it occurs in the Moeras and Tradouw Rivers. Whether the similar fishes from the Breede River and Heuningnes River are also P. Burchelli is undetermined.

Pins are Wikidata “endemic to” fields. Orange dots, when present, are GBIF occurrence tiles — survey bias included.

Habits

Burchell's redfin, also known as the Tradouw redfin, Tradou redfin or Breede redfin, is an African freshwater fish species in the family Cyprinidae.

In crisis

Two populations are known with certainty, one in the Moeras River at Barrydale and one at the Tradouw River at Tradouws Pass. Other fish are rare, and in Burchell's redfin's range these seem to consist of the introduced bluegill (Lepomis macrochirus) and Banded Tilapia (Tilapia sparrmanii) only. The introduced smallmouth bass (Micropterus dolomieu) is expanding in the region and apparently destroys P. Burchelli stocks as it does so.

Consequently, Burchell's redfin is considered to be in serious danger of going extinct within a few years. It is assessed to be critically endangered by the IUCN. No conservation plan has been proposed for the species yet.

Burchell's Redfin is Critically Endangered on this catalog because that is the IUCN category stored on Wikidata. Confirm the official criteria and any later count on iucnredlist.org.

Sources

Written for this catalog from the English Wikipedia article on Burchell's Redfin, Wikidata item Q3237999. Family and order context is original field-guide writing about the group, not a copied assessment of this one species. Wikipedia text is CC BY-SA. Not an IUCN assessment. Counts, when quoted, can change — confirm them on the recovery programme and on iucnredlist.org.