Tecopa-Kärpfling
| Tecopa-Kärpfling | ||||||||||||
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Tecopa-Kärpfling ( Cyprinodon nevadensis calidae ) |
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| Cyprinodon nevadensis calidae | ||||||||||||
| Miller , 1948 |
The Tecopa carafe ( Cyprinodon nevadensis calidae ) is an extinct subspecies of the Nevada desert fish ( Cyprinodon nevadensis ).
description
The Tecopa Kärpfling was discovered in 1942 and first described by Robert Rush Miller in 1948. The only 1.5 cm tall larvae had a predominantly blue and purple shimmering coat of scales. There was a vertical stripe at the tail end. The females differed from the males by a striped pattern. Its diet consisted of blue-green algae. Offspring of two to ten generations were produced in one year.
habitat
The Tecopa Karpfling was endemic to the salty ponds of Tecopa Hot Springs, two 42 ° C mineral springs about 35 miles east of the southern entrance to the Valley of Death in Inyo County , California . This made Tecopa Hot Springs one of the hottest habitats for a freshwater fish in the United States. The springs were about 10 m apart and had a common flow. However, the fish did not live in the hot area of the springs, but several 100 meters downstream, where the water had cooled to around 35 ° C.
die out
In the early 1940s, the northern and southern sources of Tecopa Hot Springs began to be canalized and bathhouses built. In the years that followed, these mineral springs became so popular that holiday homes and caravan parks were built in the area. In 1965 the outflow from the two springs was connected and the remaining canal straightened. This led to such a strong increase in the temperature in the habitat of the Tecopa carrage that further survival was hardly guaranteed. At the same time the Koboldkärpfling ( Gambusia affinis ) and the blue sunfish ( Lepomis macrochirus ) were introduced in Tecopa Hot Springs, which simulated the Tecopa Karpflingen. In 1970 the Tecopa-Kärpfling was last detected in an artificially created pond. After intensive searches failed between 1977 and 1979, it was removed from the US Fish and Wildlife Service's list of endangered species in 1981 . At the same time, the Tecopa-Kärpfling was the first animal species to be officially declared extinct under the statutes of the Endangered Species Act of 1973.
literature
- David Day (1981). The Doomsday Book of Animals , Ebury Press, London, ISBN 0-670-27987-0
- Richard Dana Ono, James D. Williams, Anne Wagner (1983): Vanishing Fishes of North America , Stonewall Press Inc. Washington DC, ISBN 0-913276-43-X
Web links
- Tecopa-Kärpfling on Fishbase.org (English)
- Tecopa pupfish gives its life for a bathhouse (PDF; 158 kB)
- Extinct Animals - The Tecopa pupfish