| Breeding peaks during the rainy season, with the largest proportion of mature females noted mainly towards the end of the rainy season (March). Spawning abundance recorded above was taken during the dry season as sampling is gravely threatened by flooding during the rainy season. However, like other cave-dwelling species, T. itacarambiensis has its reproductive cycle synchronized with the oncoming flood which brings high volume of food for the young that have been born earlier on and have attained a size big enough to escape being washed away with the flood (Ref. 32807). Among individuals kept in captivity, some catfishes developed mature gonads during the rainy season but no fishes matured during the dry season food provisions(May-September) |