Taxonomy & naming
Apistogramma salpinction was described by the Swedish ichthyologist Sven O. Kullander and the Brazilian fish biologist Efrem J. G. Ferreira in 2005, in a paper titled 'Two new species of Apistogramma Regan (Teleostei: Cichlidae) from the rio Trombetas, Pará State, Brazil' (Neotropical Ichthyology 3(3):361–371). The species hint in the assignment brief — 'Ready & Kullander 2004' — is incorrect and has been corrected here: that authority and date belong to a different Trombetas-region apisto, Apistogramma eremnopyge; salpinction is unambiguously Kullander & Ferreira, 2005, as confirmed by Eschmeyer's Catalog of Fishes, FishBase and GBIF. The holotype is INPA 24507, an adult male of 1.5 in standard length, with six paratypes (INPA 12649 and NRM 37027), all collected together on 15 October 1985 by E. Ferreira during a survey of aquatic fauna for a planned hydroelectric reservoir. The type locality is a very large swamp at kilometre 70 on the margin of road BR-163, in the lower rio Trombetas drainage of Pará, Brazil — roughly 43 mi from the village of Cachoeira Porteira, above the rapids that divide the river. Kullander & Ferreira placed the species in the Apistogramma cacatuoides species group, based on its produced dorsal-fin lappets, marginal caudal-fin streamers in males, five dentary pores and two postlachrymal infraorbital pores. That placement is not settled: the foremost living authority on the genus, Mike Wise, has argued in the apistogramma.com community that salpinction sits closer to the brevis group (near Apistogramma personata and the undescribed 'Broad-banded' form) than to true cacatuoides relatives. In the hobby's running catalogue of forms it is logged as Apistogramma sp. 'Trombetas 2' (code A-173). The epithet is a near-bilingual joke on the part of its describers: from the Greek noun salpinctes (σαλπιγκτής), 'trumpeter', with the diminutive suffix -ion, alluding at once to the type-locality drainage — the Trombetas, Portuguese for 'trumpets' — and to the fish's very small body. It is treated as a noun in apposition.
Morphology
This is a small, robust, moderately deep-bodied dwarf cichlid: body depth runs 32–38% of standard length, the snout is short and rounded, and the predorsal and prepelvic profiles rise at about the same angle. It is genuinely tiny. The largest known specimen, the male holotype, measures 1.5 in SL (FishBase rounds this to a 1.5 in SL maximum); the paratype males span 1 in and females 1 in, and the first aquarium-bred males offered by a German importer in 2025 were only about 1 in long excluding the tail. Coloration in the preserved types is muted — a yellowish-white ground, brownish head and back, lighter flanks, with no vertical bars. What distinguishes salpinction from every other Apistogramma is the pattern toward the rear of the body: a broad brownish lateral band and several abdominal stripes that are faint up front but darken markedly on the caudal peduncle, where high-contrast pale interspaces set them off, and a caudal-base spot that is split into elongated blotches continuing the lateral band and the upper two abdominal stripes onto the tail. The soft dorsal, anal and caudal fins are immaculate (unspotted), unlike the spotted soft fins of true cacatuoides-group members, and both sexes carry a clear submarginal hyaline stripe in the upper caudal fin. Sexual dimorphism is pronounced and typical of the group's males: adult males develop prolonged anterior dorsal-fin lappets and long upper-and-lower caudal-fin streamers, a produced first pelvic-fin ray, and (in live aquarium fish) a suggestion of orange in the throat and belly. Females stay smaller, with short rounded dorsal lappets, blackened anterior pelvic fins and an intense black midventral stripe running back to the anal fin. Because streamer and lappet development is partly size-related in Apistogramma, the most ornate males are large individuals well past the maximum size of females.
Habitat
Apistogramma salpinction is known, in the strict scientific sense, from a single place: the BR-163 roadside swamp at kilometre 70 in the lower rio Trombetas drainage, a clearwater left-bank tributary of the lower Amazon in Pará, Brazil. The Trombetas joins the Amazon near Oriximiná; the type locality lies above the river's rapids, where Kullander notes only a handful of apistos occur — Apistogramma pertensis, the minute Apistogramma angayuara, salpinction itself, and an undescribed steindachneri-group fish. The habitat is emphatically not a flowing-water biotope. It is a large, muddy-bottomed swamp, very shallow at the time of collection — in places no more than 2 in deep — that probably connects to the igarapé Caxipacoré during the high-water season and dries out in the dry season. In-situ water chemistry was not recorded in the original description, and no field measurements of temperature, pH or hardness for this species have been published; the figures in the fact panel are therefore inferred from captive husbandry and from the soft, acidic blackwater-and-swamp conditions typical of lowland Amazonian Apistogramma, and should be read as estimates rather than measured field data. The German aquarists and breeders who first kept wild stock report it thriving at around pH 6 and 79 °F. The recorded ≤2 in sampling depth is a real datum but reflects only the dry-season low; the deeper high-water phase has not been measured. As the importer Aquarium Glaser observed, this kind of murky, fish-poor mud swamp is exactly the sort of place ornamental collectors normally avoid, which goes a long way to explaining why a fish described in 2005 stayed out of the hobby for almost two decades.
Feeding
There is no published study of what Apistogramma salpinction eats in the wild, and the original description — based on long-preserved museum specimens — does not report stomach contents. Its dentition and ecology, however, point firmly to the same niche as its congeners. The jaws carry rows of small, erect, inward-curving caniniform teeth, and the lower pharyngeal tooth-plate bears a mix of bicuspid and slender unicuspid teeth — the generalised arrangement of a micropredator that picks small invertebrates and organic particles from soft substrate and leaf litter. Like other dwarf Apistogramma, it is best understood as a benthic micro-invertivore, sifting the top layer of mud and detritus for chironomid larvae, microcrustaceans and similar small prey; FishBase places it at a trophic level near 3.2, consistent with that role. (Its tiny Trombetas neighbour Apistogramma angayuara is notable for the opposite reason — it is the first cichlid found to feed largely on rhizopods, single-celled protozoans — but no comparable specialisation has been demonstrated for salpinction.) In captivity it accepts the standard dwarf-cichlid fare of small live and frozen foods that sink to the bottom. Any diet statement here is therefore a genus-typical inference, clearly flagged as such, not a measured result for this species.
Mating
Reproductive behaviour has not been observed or described in the wild for Apistogramma salpinction, so this section necessarily reads across from the better-studied members of its group, flagged as inference. Across Apistogramma, the near-universal pattern is a female-centred system: a small female establishes and fiercely defends a cave-like spawning territory while a larger, more ornate male holds a broader area overlapping one or several females — effectively a harem in species with strong size dimorphism, which salpinction has. The conspicuous male finery seen here — the produced dorsal lappets, the long caudal streamers, the hint of orange — is courtship signalling, displayed to females and in standoffs with rival males. Importantly, the limited aquarium experience to date suggests salpinction is not difficult or unusually aggressive by apisto standards: a German breeder reported a wild-caught pair that proved straightforward to keep and to spawn. Beyond that, pre-spawning ritual, pair dynamics and the degree of harem polygyny in this particular species remain undocumented.
Breeding
No spawning of Apistogramma salpinction has been documented in nature, and detail even from captivity is thin — but the species has now been bred. After a German aquarist tracked down and imported live wild fish, a breeder produced the first captive offspring, offered commercially in early 2025, in soft water around pH 6 at 79 °F. That places salpinction firmly within the normal Apistogramma reproductive mould, which is the safest basis for describing its likely biology (and is flagged here as inference rather than first-hand observation of this species). Members of the genus are cave-spawning substrate brooders: the female deposits a modest clutch of adhesive eggs on the roof or wall of a cavity — a hollow under wood, a leaf, a snail shell or, in the aquarium, a small cave or upturned flowerpot — then tends and fans them while the male patrols the wider territory. Clutch sizes in small cacatuoides-group and comparable dwarf apistos typically run from a few dozen up to roughly 80 eggs, scaling with the small size of the female; a precise fecundity figure for salpinction has not been published, so the value given is a clearly-labelled genus-typical estimate. Care is essentially maternal at the nest, with the female leading and guarding free-swimming fry through the leaf litter while the male defends the perimeter — the standard, and effective, dwarf-cichlid strategy.
In the aquarium
Apistogramma salpinction is exceptionally rare in captivity. The first known live specimens entered the hobby when a single German aquarist tracked down wild-caught fish, apparently around 2024; captive-bred offspring from those fish were offered commercially for the first time in early 2025 by Aquarium Glaser. What little aquarium experience exists comes from that handful of keepers, and most of what follows is necessarily extrapolated from the care of closely related small Apistogramma — Apistogramma personata, Apistogramma brevis and the smaller cacatuoides-group dwarfs — which share a similar ecology and chemistry. That inference is flagged clearly throughout, and anyone keeping this species should regard their own observations as genuinely novel and worth sharing.
A pair can be maintained in a tank of about 15 US gal (roughly 60 × 12 in footprint), and a harem of one male with two or three females can work in 20–25 US gal provided sight-lines are broken. Because wild fish were found at pH 5.8–6.0 and 79 °F, and the first captive breeding was reported at pH ~6 and 79 °F, the aquarium should be kept soft, warm and acidic: pH 5.0–6.5, temperature 75–82 °F, and hardness in the very soft range. Reconstituted reverse-osmosis water or naturally soft rain-collected water is strongly preferred over hard tap water; elevated carbonate hardness both suppresses breeding and appears to stress fish long-term. Husbandry that hits these parameters puts the keeper firmly in the safe zone for this species.
The set-up should mimic a leaf-litter swamp rather than a clear-stream biotope. A fine sand substrate (white or light-coloured to show the fish's pattern well) covered with a loose layer of dried beech or oak leaf litter is ideal; the litter contributes tannins, provides micro-invertebrate colonisation, and offers natural cover for females. Driftwood roots, moss clumps and low-light plants like Java fern or Bucephalandra add further shelter without encroaching on the open sand-and-litter floor where the fish spend most of their time. Multiple small caves — clay pots, coconut-shell halves, stacked slate — are essential: females will not spawn without them, and having more caves than females reduces conflict. Small, peaceful mid-water dither fish (tetras in the 1–1.5 in range, such as Nannostomus or Hyphessobrycon species that tolerate similarly soft acidic water) calm territorial tension by suggesting open-water safety.
Tankmates should be selected carefully, and with full awareness that salpinction is among the smallest cichlids in the hobby — at ~1.5 in SL, even peaceful fish that are significantly larger become a threat or a stressor. Do not combine it with other bottom-dwellers that compete for caves or territories; corydoras and loricariids can be housed with larger apistos but in a tank this size and with a fish this small they are better avoided or used only with large volumes and generous territory structure. The species appears to be no more aggressive than comparable dwarfs — the first keeper reported a wild-caught pair that was notably straightforward — but territorial clashes between females during brooding can be lethal in small tanks, and the male's territory will overlap theirs. Sexing is straightforward once fish are adult: males are larger, develop the extended lappets and caudal streamers, and show orange-yellow ventral wash in good condition; females stay smaller, rounder-bodied, and show the diagnostic black midventral stripe and blackened anterior pelvic fins.
Overall difficulty is rated as moderate, primarily because of the strict water-chemistry demands and the challenge of sourcing the fish at all — not because the species is intrinsically difficult to keep once conditions are met. The most common keeper mistakes with small, chemistry-sensitive apistos are insufficient attention to pH stability (using insufficiently softened water and then watching pH creep up), overcrowded or cave-poor set-ups that produce lethal female-female combat, and overfeeding without adequate filtration in small tanks. Live or frozen small invertebrates — artemia nauplii, micro-worms, Daphnia, chironomid larvae — should form the core diet; the species will accept high-quality frozen foods and small-particle dry foods but should not rely on them exclusively. Given how little is documented about this fish, every successful breeding and every behavioural observation is a real contribution, and keepers are strongly encouraged to report their findings to the apistogramma.com community and to AMAZONAS Magazine.
Conservation
The IUCN Red List assesses Apistogramma salpinction as Data Deficient (DD), assessed on 7 November 2018 by Brazil's Instituto Chico Mendes de Conservação da Biodiversidade (ICMBio). Data Deficient is not a clean bill of health — it means there is simply not enough information to judge extinction risk. That is an honest verdict for a fish known from one swamp, from a single 1985 collection, with no population data, no measured habitat chemistry and, until very recently, no live observations at all. There is no CITES listing, and the species has no fishery value; even ornamental collection has been negligible, precisely because its muddy swamp habitat is unappealing to commercial catchers. The salient point sits in the collection history: the types were gathered during a survey for a planned hydroelectric reservoir on the Trombetas. Damming, along with the broader pressures bearing on the Amazon basin — deforestation, gold-mining and mercury contamination, and the alteration of seasonal flood pulses that fish of ephemeral swamps depend on — are the kinds of threats most relevant to a narrowly known, single-locality species like this one. None of these has been documented as an actual decline in salpinction, and it may yet prove more widespread once its drab habitat is properly surveyed. But a fish this geographically pinned, this poorly sampled and this dependent on a seasonally flooded backwater is exactly the profile that warrants caution rather than complacency.