Thymallus yaluensis

Thymallus yaluensis
Scientific classification
Domain:	Eukaryota
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Chordata
Class:	Actinopterygii
Order:	Salmoniformes
Family:	Salmonidae
Genus:	Thymallus
Species:	T. yaluensis
Binomial name
Thymallus yaluensis T. Mori, 1928

Thymallus yaluensis, also known as Yalu grayling, is a putative species of freshwater ray-finned fish in the genus Thymallus (graylings) of the family Salmonidae. It is endemic to the upper Yalu River on the China-North Korea border.[1]

Description

Thymallus yaluensis is a small fish, with a maximum recorded length of 20 cm (7.9 in).[1] It is renowned in Korea for having "the most beautiful form and fins of a freshwater fish".[1]

Taxonomy dispute

Some confusion exists regarding the identity of T. yaluensis, as it closely resembles the Arctic grayling (Thymallus arcticus) in form and has often been treated as a subspecies (T. a. yaluensis).[2] However, FishBase recognizes it as an independent species.[1] According to mitochondrial DNA, T. yaluensis is, however, inseparable from the Amur grayling (Thymallus grubii), and was suggested to be a junior synonym of that.[3] Confusingly, it has also been reported from widely separate regions including Siberia, the Alps in Europe, and the northern Mississippi River drainage in North America.^[citation needed]

References

1. Froese, Rainer; Pauly, Daniel (eds.). "Thymallus yaluensis". FishBase. April 2015 version.
2. Eschmeyer W (2015) yaluensis, Thymallus Catalog of Fishes, California Academy of Sciences.
3. MA Bo, HUO Tang-Bin, JIANG Zuo-Fa (2008) Thymallus arcticus yaluensis is a synonym of T. grubii by mitochondrial control region sequences analysis. Acta Zootaxonomica Sinica 33 (2)