Taxonomy of Finfish (1+2)

4.1.2.3 Family : Bargridae (bagrid cat fishes)

o Freshwater, Africa and Asia (to Japan & Borneo)

o Dorsal fin has one spine along with 6 or 7 soft rays (rarely 8 – 20)

o Adipose fin present and highly variable in size between species

o Pectoral fin serrated

o Usually four pairs of well developed barbells

• widely distributed in fresh and brackish-water bodies
  
• rayed dorsal fin inserted above first half of pectoral fin and anal fin mostly short.
  
• Jayaram,K.C. (1972) divided the family into 5 subfamilies: Ritinae, Chyrsichyinae, Bagrinae, Bagroidinae and Auchenoglaninae. Chrysichthyininae was further subdivided into three tribes.

Five subfamilies are now in vogue with the following genera :

1. Ritinae. This was proposed by me in my revision and it is now valid. The Indian genera are: Rita Bleeker only, although under this subfamily another African genera Nanobagrus has been included by Mo. The main character is the presence of 7 or 8 pelvic rays against 6 in other bagrid genera.
2. Bagrinae. This was proposed by Regan (1911) and is valid. The Indian genera are:
3. Sperata (in place of Aorichthys Wu, Osteobagrus Jayaram); Mystus; Hemibagrus; Rama,, Neotropius (previously considered under Schilbidae but osteological studies have shown that it belongs to Bagridae).
4. Batasininae proposed by Tilak is valid . Batasio is the only genus.
5. Olyrinae. Previously treated as a separate family create d by Hora (1936), it has been shown by Mo (1991) that Olyra the only genus is deeply nested within other Bagrid genera and as such cannot be retrained as a separate family.

This family consists of 30 genera and with roughly 210 species

1. Austroglanis 8. Gephyroglanis

2. Auchenoglanis 9. Leiocassis (= Liocassis)

3. Bagruchrhys 10. Mystus

4. Bagroides 11. Parauchenoglarus

5. Bagrys 12. Pelteobagrus

6. Chrysichthys 13. Platyglarus

7. Clarotes 14. Pseudobagrus

15. Rita