During a visit to the Museum of Zoology at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor in May 1993, under the invitation of the late Dr. Robert Rush Miller, professor emeritus and then curator of the collection, I noticed a glass jar on his desk labeled "Cichlasoma usumacintae" which contained three preserved fish. Not recalling any species by that name but recognizing the species, I asked Dr. Miller about it. He explained that the fish had been collected in 1935 by Carl Hubbs—his predecessor and father-in-law—in the Usumacinta drainage in Guatemala. Hubbs had recognized the species as new, noted the intended name, and preserved the fish, hoping to describe it later—a task that, likely due to lack of time, was never completed. Dr. Miller had also referenced the fish as “Cichlasoma usumacintae” in a 1986 publication (Miller, 1986: table 1), and intended to describe it carrying on with Hubb’s desires, as he explained to me. I informed Dr. Miller that the species had recently been rediscovered by Jean Claude Nourissat of France, who had published a picture of the fish in the Revue Française des Cichlidophiles in 1991. Dr. Miller requested a copy of the article, which I sent upon returning home. I heard nothing else from Dr. Miller about this fish.
All of this occurred nine years before the species was officially described by Robert Allgayer as Vieja ufermanni in 2002, published in L'an Cichlidé (2:14-17) in France. Allgayer based his description on three specimens collected by Jean-Claude Nourissat in April 1989 in the Rio Pucté, a tributary of the Usumacinta River drainage in Guatemala (MNHN 2002-1090, holotype; MNHN 2002-1091 and MNHN 2002-1092, paratypes). Allgayer was likely unaware of Hubbs' original collection or of Robert Miller's intentions to describe the species.
Based on the photograph of the Vieja ufermanni holotype (MNHN 2002-1090), I suggested (Artigas Azas, 2020) that the holotype might have been misidentified and was actually a specimen of Cincelichthys bocourti. This conclusion was drawn from the position of the mouth, body shape, and color pattern, which more closely resemble Cincelichthys bocourti. I expressed that if this is the case, the name Vieja ufermanni would become an objective junior synonym of Cincelichthys bocourti, regardless of the validity of the species Allgayer originally intended to describe.
McMahan & Matamoros (2015) described the genus Kihnichthys, providing a weak (and inapplicable) diagnosis to differentiate Vieja ufermanni from the genus Cincelichthys, primarily based on the size of the caudal blotch in three specimens of K. ufermanni they examined. In 2020, I proposed synonymizing Kihnichthys with Cincelichthys.
In a recent article, Willem Heijns (2024) elaborates on the topic and compares the photograph of the holotype of Vieja ufermanni with those of the paratypes and its description. He concludes that the specimen representing the species—unlike the paratypes—is quite likely a specimen of Cincelichthys bocourti. It is probable that Allgayer made an error in selecting the wrong fish as the holotype, which ultimately invalidates his attempt to describe the new species.
If this turns out to be true, where does that leave us? First, any debate over the validity of Kihnichthys could be settled—Kihnichthys would be a synonym of Cincelichthys, or whatever genus C. bocourti is classified into in the future. More importantly, Vieja ufermanni would become an objective junior synonym of C. bocourti, leaving the species “Cichlasoma usumacintae” still without proper classification, even after all these years. A new description will need to be made for it. With Robert Miller having passed away in 2003, someone else will have to undertake this task. Perhaps this time, the name “usumacintae” could be restored to the species as originally intended.
“Cichlasoma usumacintae” remains one of the most enigmatic North American cichlids. Known to grow up to 25 cm, this species is endemic to the central lowlands of the Usumacinta River drainage in Mexico and Guatemala. It inhabits waters with mild to swift currents in rivers such as La Pasión, Subín, Chocolja (Corzo), Lacantún, Pucté, and a small clear-water tributary of the Río de La Pasión. Except for the latter, all these rivers are wide, often spanning more than 10 meters.
