Critically Endangered
Lake Wanam rainbowfish
Glossolepis wanamensis
Lake Wanam rainbowfish is endemic to Lake Wanam near Lae in Papua New Guinea.
The rainbowfish
Rainbowfishes are slender, schooling freshwater fishes of New Guinea and Australia, usually from a named river or lake.
Silversides and rainbowfishes are usually slender schooling fishes of lakes, estuaries, or clear streams.
Range and habitat
It is endemic to Lake Wanam near Lae in Papua New Guinea. It has virtually disappeared from the small lake (2–3 km in diameter) due to competition from introduced, non-native tilapias, but captive populations exist.
Pins are Wikidata “endemic to” fields. Orange dots, when present, are GBIF occurrence tiles — survey bias included.
Habits
Silversides and rainbowfishes need clear water and a place to school. A lake form does not commute to the next basin.
In crisis
Lake Wanam rainbowfish 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 Lake Wanam rainbowfish — often a short stub, Wikidata item Q1676798. 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.
