Leptobotia elongata

The body is long and flattened laterally, with a high and strong caudal peduncle. The head is flattened and pointed laterally, and the head is longer than the body height. The snout is rounded and short, the mouth is relatively large, sub-inferior, and the mouth cleft is horseshoe-shaped. The upper and lower lips are thick; the lip folds are separated from the jaws, and there is no button-like protrusion under the chin. There are 3 pairs of whiskers, 2 pairs of snout whiskers, and 1 pair of mouth whiskers. The eyes are very small, with a smooth hard spine at the lower edge of the eyes, the end of which exceeds the rear edge of the eyes. The spine under the eyes is not forked, and its length is greater than the diameter of the eyes. The nostrils are close to the front edge of the eyes, the anterior nostrils are tubular, the posterior nostrils are larger, and there is a separate skin fold between the front and rear nostrils. The gill openings are small, and the gill membranes are connect

The long thin loach is a species unique to my country and is distributed in the middle and upper reaches of the Yangtze River from Hunan, Hubei to western Sichuan.

Leptobotia elongata (scientific name: Leptobotia elongata) is a fish of the genus Leptobotia in the family Cobitidae of the order Cypriniformes. It is a giant among loaches and one of the largest loaches in the world.

The long thin loach is a warm-water bottom fish that likes to live in the middle and upper reaches of rivers and in the cracks between gravels where the water flow is slow. It often clusters among the gravels or rock cracks at the bottom of the water. It has the habit of swimming upstream when the river is flooded.

The long thin loach is a bottom-dwelling ferocious carnivorous fish that mainly feeds on small fish, aquatic insects, shrimps, large zooplankton, etc. It is the fastest growing and largest fish in the family Cobitidae. The average individual weight is 1.0-1.5 kg, and the largest individual can reach about 3 kg. Under artificial breeding conditions, it also feeds on compound feed. It grows fast, with an average weight of 60.3 grams at one year old, and can reach commercial specifications at 1-2 years old, with high nutritional value.

The gonadal structure of the long thin loach is different in males and females. The male testes are paired and milky white; the female ovaries are light flesh-colored in the early stages of development and blue-gray or light yellow in the later stages. Its reproductive period is from March to May, and the eggs are sticky and attached to the stone for hatching.

The long thin loach once accounted for a certain proportion of the catch in the main and tributary rivers of the middle and upper reaches of the Yangtze River, and is one of the important economic fish in the production area. However, in recent years, due to the overall decline in the amount of fish resources in rivers, the small fish that serve as its food have decreased significantly, which has a certain impact on the growth of the long thin loach; secondly, soil erosion in the middle and upper reaches of rivers and changes in hydrological conditions have destroyed its feeding and spawning sites; coupled with comprehensive factors such as overfishing, the natural resources of the long thin loach have been sharply reduced, and the population has dropped significantly. At present, the long thin loach is listed as vulnerable (VU) in both the "Red List of Chinese Species" and the "Red Book of Endangered Animals in China - Fishes".

It is listed in the second level of the "List of National Key Protected Wildlife in China". (Wild populations only)

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