New name for Panda loach, Yaoshania pachychilus; and a new species of Erromyzon is described

Hora (1932) described the genus Protomyzon from Borneo, with P. whiteheadi (Vaillant, 1893) as type species. Later, three more species were described also from Borneo. Two further species of Protomyzon were described from China: P. sinensis Chen, 1980 and P. pachychilus Chen, 1980. Kottelat (2004) commented that Protomyzon species are restricted to Borneo and that the Chinese species belong to a distinct genus which named Erromyzon. There are three Erromyzon fishes: Erromyzon sinensis, E. compactus and E. yangi.

For better understanding panda loach, Yang et al. (2012) examined the types of “Protomyzon pachychilus” and E. sinensis, combined with new collections, to re-describe the panda loach as a new genus, Yaoshania, for it is only distributed in Dayaoshan Mountains, Guangxi, Southern China.

Yaoshania is distinguished from other genera of Balitoridae by its larger gill opening, a lip lamina at angle of mouth, and the rostral fold with four notches to accommodate rostral barbels. A new species of Erromyzon is also described in the same paper.

For more information, please see the paper: Yang Jian, Maurice Kottelat, Chen Xiaoyong, Yang Junxing. 2012. Yaoshania and Erromyzon kalotaenia, a new genus and a new species of balitorid loaches from Guangxi, China (Teleostei: Cypriniformes). Zootaxa. 3586: 173-186.