Cobitis elazigensis Coad & Sarieyy, 1988

Saad, Adib, Çiçek, Erdoğan, Esmaeili, Hamid Reza, Fricke, Ronald, Sungur, Sevil & Eagderi, Soheil, 2023, Freshwater fishes of Syria: a revised and updated annotated checklist- 2023, Zootaxa 5350 (1), pp. 1-62 : 10

Cobitis elazigensis Coad & Sarieyy ̡poglu, 1988 [N]—Tigris spined loach; Tinia

Taxonomy. Original description: Cobitis elazigensis Coad & Sarieyyüpoglu, 1988: 426 , figs. 1-2 [creek at Cip, drainage of Murat Nehri, tributary of Euphrates River, Elazig Province, Turkey, 38°42’N, 39°05’E; holotype: NMC 85-0679A].—Syrian synonyms: None.—Revisions: Freyhof et al. (2018: 16).—Illustration: Coad & Sarieyyüpoglu (1988: figs. 1-2).

Status in Syria. Recorded from Syria by Coad (2010: 202) as Cobitis taenia (non Linnaeus, 1758) (see Freyhof et al. 2018: 16).—Syrian material: None.

Distribution and habitat. Distribution in Syria: Euphrates River. We sampled from Turkish part of the border in Karkamýþ Dam Lake.—Distribution in River Basin: 2-Euphrates & Aleppo.—General distribution: Asia Minor and Middle East: Upper Euphrates River basin in Turkey, Iran and Syria.—441-Lower Tigris & Euphrates, 442-Upper Tigris & Euphrates.—Habitat: This species lives in streams and lakes with sand or fine gravel bottoms. Freshwater.

Economic importance. No commercial importance.

Conservation. Conservation status in Syria: Unknown.—IUCN: LC ( IUCN 2023).—Threats: This species seems to have a very large population in Atatürk reservoir and its tributaries, and maybe reservoirs in Syria, where no threats are obvious. Elsewhere it is locally found in lowland streams and small rivers where pollution and water abstraction are a threat. The loss of stream populations is suspected to be balanced by reservoir populations.—Moderate sensitivity to human activities.—Keystone species.—Decline status: Stable.— Moderate priority for conservation action.