Widely-distributed throughout the Amazon, Orinoco, Essequibo, and Tocantins river systems in Brazil, Peru, Bolivia, Ecuador, Colombia, Venezuela, and Guyana.

Type locality is ‘Rio Cupai [= Rio Cupari], Rio Tapajós basin, Amazon River drainage, Pará State, Brazil’.

An obligate predator feeding on other fishes in nature, but quality dried foods are normally accepted in captivity.

It should also be offered meaty fare such as strips of white fish, live earthworms, shrimp, etc., for optimum health.

This species is relatively common in the aquarium hobby but is not easy to maintain and recommended only for experienced aquarists.

It can be told apart from all congeners by specimens larger than 60 mm SL possessing an extended pectoral-fin spine forming an extremely long filament that may be more than four times the length of the first branched pectoral-fin ray (vs. not possessing such a filament in other species of Lamontichthys).

This species has had several L-numbers assigned to it, with L146 collected from an unspecified locality in Colombia and L232 from the Río Putomayo/Içá.

It’s exported for the aquarium trade under a number of different generic names including Hemiancistrus, Sophiancistrus and Peckoltichthys.

Following Armbruster (2008) it can be to…

This species was formerly included in the genus Brochis alongside C. britskii and C. multiradiatus, and is sometimes referred to as ‘common brochis’. Juveniles have a mottled colour pattern and are sometimes traded as ‘hi-fin cory’ due to their enlarged dorsal-fin.

C. splendens can be told apart from other ex-Brochis species by possession of 10-12 dorsal-fin rays…

The genus is included in the family Callichthyidae, of which members are often referred to collectively as ‘armoured’ or ‘mailed’ catfishes group due to the presence of bony plates in place of scales on the body.

Their taxonomy can be confusing, and numerous undescribed species are also thought to exist.

Both species also possesses a broader dark midlateral stripe on the body which tends to be more well-defined in B. lateristriga than in B. maculata.

Colour pattern in B. maculata varies considerably with some specimens noticeably paler than others, for example, and the the broad midlateral stripe usually less intense in such individuals.

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This species is rare in the aquarium trade but is arguably more suitable for the home aquarium than some of its better-known relatives given its adult size and relatively docile behaviour.

Other vernacular names include ‘Dientón’ (Peru), ‘Perrito’ (Ecuador), ‘Payara-chata’ or ‘Payarin’ (Venezuela) and ‘Icanga’, ‘Minguilista’ or ‘Peice-cachorro’ (Brazil), some of which are also applied to related species.

Known from the middle and upper Amazon river basins in Brazil, Peru, Ecuador and Colombia.

Type locality is ‘Amazon River at Obidos, Cudajas, and Tabatinga; Rio Negro, Brazil.’

It apparently practises an interesting reproductive strategy in which the eggs are deposited in a shallow depression excavated from the substrate and guarded by the male.

This species can be confused with three similar-looking fishes of uncertain taxonomic status which have been assigned the C numbers C024, C077, and C109 in the aquarium hobby.

C024 and C109 are unlikely to be conspecific in that they occur in Pará state, Brazil, several thousand kilometers outside the range of C. acutus, in the rio Guamá (Tocantins drainage), and lower rio Xingu, respectively.