Reproduced here with permission of the author and publisher. A redfin minnow adapted to a high altitude mountainous habitat, with small scales, high vertebral count and a flattened ventral profile. The body is slender, the mouth is sub-termina l with a single pair of short barbels, the scales are radiately striated and the pectoral fins are large and horizontally inserted.
Pigmentation depends on the habitat as well as physiological state.
The bases of the fins are scarlet in adults, the body v arying from dirty olive brown to bluish olive in breeding males with ventral surface silvery white with a scaleless chest. Different populations have distinct patterns of dark spots or wavy lines dorsally and there is a dark lateral band on the trunk. Sex ual dimorphism is expressed in reproductively active males through variations in pigmentation and degree of tubercle development on the head and body as well as the shape and size of the pelvic and pectoral fins. One of only seven species in the genus Pseudobarbus , the flexible-rayed redfin minnows. This is a distinct group of barbine minnows from the Cape Fold and the Drakensberg Mountains which appear to be descendants of an ancient lineage in southern Africa.