Freshwater fish communities in Ecuador exhibit some of the highest levels of diversity and endemism in the Neotropics. Unfortunately, aquatic ecosystems in the country are under serious threat and conditions are deteriorating. In 2018–19, the government of Ecuador sponsored a series of workshops to examine the conservation status of Ecuador's freshwater fishes. Concerns were identified for 35 species, most of which are native to the Amazon region, and overfishing of Amazonian pimelodid catfishes emerged as a major issue. However, much of the information needed to make decisions across fish groups and regions was not available, hindering the process and highlighting the need for a review of the conservation threats to Ecuador's freshwater fishes. Here, we review how the physical alteration of rivers, deforestation, wetland and floodplain degradation, agricultural and urban water pollution, mining, oil extraction, dams, overfishing, introduced species and climate change are affecting freshwater fishes in Ecuador. Although many of these factors affect fishes throughout the Neotropics, the lack of data on Ecuadorian fish communities is staggering and highlights the urgent need for more research. We also make recommendations, including the need for proper enforcement of existing environmental laws, restoration of degraded aquatic ecosystems, establishment of a national monitoring system for freshwater ecosystems, investment in research to fill gaps in knowledge, and encouragement of public engagement in citizen science and conservation efforts. Freshwater fishes are an important component of the cultural and biological legacy of the Ecuadorian people. Conserving them for future generations is critical.

Mammalian carnivores are considered a key group in maintaining ecological health and can indicate potential ecological integrity in landscapes where they occur. Carnivores also hold high conservation value and their habitat requirements can guide management and conservation plans. The order Carnivora has 84 species from 8 families in the Neotropical region: Canidae; Felidae; Mephitidae; Mustelidae; Otariidae; Phocidae; Procyonidae; and Ursidae. Herein, we include published and unpublished data on native terrestrial Neotropical carnivores (Canidae; Felidae; Mephitidae; Mustelidae; Procyonidae; and Ursidae). NEOTROPICAL CARNIVORES is a publicly available data set that includes 99,605 data entries from 35,511 unique georeferenced coordinates. Detection/non‐detection and quantitative data were obtained from 1818 to 2018 by researchers, governmental agencies, non‐governmental organizations, and private consultants. Data were collected using several methods including camera trapping, museum collections, roadkill, line transect, and opportunistic records. Literature (peer‐reviewed and grey literature) from Portuguese, Spanish and English were incorporated in this compilation. Most of the data set consists of detection data entries (n = 79,343; 79.7%) but also includes non‐detection data (n = 20,262; 20.3%). Of those, 43.3% also include count data (n = 43,151). The information available in NEOTROPICAL CARNIVORES will contribute to macroecological, ecological, and conservation questions in multiple spatio‐temporal perspectives. As carnivores play key roles in trophic interactions, a better understanding of their distribution and habitat requirements are essential to establish conservation management plans and safeguard the future ecological health of Neotropical ecosystems. Our data paper, combined with other large‐scale data sets, has great potential to clarify species distribution and related ecological processes within the Neotropics. There are no copyright restrictions and no restriction for using data from this data paper, as long as the data paper is cited as the source of the information used. We also request that users inform us of how they intend to use the data.

El leucismo es una aberración cromática poco frecuente, manifestada por la ausencia total o parcial de melanina en la piel. Este estudio reporta un caso de leucismo en el pez Lebiasina bimaculata (Characiformes: Lebiasinidae), en el río Chongón, Ecuador. El individuo con leucismo presentó despigmentación en todo el cuerpo, excepto en el iris y en la base de la tercera escama de la cuarta serie de escamas longitudinales. Con este suman 19 los registros de aberraciones cromáticas en peces dulceacuícolas de Suramérica. Palabras clave. Aberraciones pigmentarias. Characiformes. Peces dulceacuícolas. Río Guayas.

EN CIENCIAS E INGENIERÍAS AVANCES AbstractWe report two cases of parasitism by Riggia Szidat 1948 on freshwater fish of the genera Chaetostoma and Rhamdia from two rivers on the Upper Amazon of Ecuador, in the icthyogeographic areas of Alto Pastaza and Upano-Zamora. Riggia sp. was in both cases inside the abdominal cavity, forming large capsules between the peritoneum and pericardium.Keywords. Riggia, Cymothoidae, Isopoda, Chaetostoma, Loricariidae, Rhamdia quelen, Heptapteridae, Siluriformes, freshwater fishes, parasitism, Amazonia, Pastaza, MoronaSantiago, Ecuador. ResumenReportamos dos casos de parasitismo del isópodo Riggia Szidat 1948 en peces de los gé-neros Chaetostoma y Rhamdia provenientes de dos ríos de la alta Amazonía de Ecuador, en las zonas ictiogeográficas Alto Pastaza y Upano-Zamora. Riggia sp. se alojó en ambos casos dentro de la cavidad abdominal, formando un cápsula grande entre el peritoneo y el pericardio.Palabras Clave. Riggia, Cymothoidae, Isopoda, Chaetostoma, Loricariidae, Rhamdia quelen, Heptapteridae, Siluriformes, parasitism, peces dulceacuícolas, Amazonía, Pastaza, Morona-Santiago, Ecuador.De las 95 familias de Isopoda, Bopyridae, Cryptoniscidae, Cymothoidae, Dajidae, Entoniscidae, Gnathiidae y Tridentellidae parasitan peces [1]. En América del Sur al menos 12 géneros de isópodos, en su mayoría de la familia Cymothoidae, parasitan peces dulceacuícolas [2]. Cymothoidae son isópodos ectoparásitos con el cuerpo dorso-ventralmente aplanado que usan sus 7 pares de patas para adherirse a la piel, agallas o alojarse en la cavidad branquial, bucal, abdominal o debajo de las escamas de los peces hospederos, donde forman cápsulas [3][4][5][6]. La mayor diversidad de Cymothoidae se distribuye en América del Sur, con 27 especies y nueve géneros reconocidos [7]. Szidat [8] describió el género Riggia en base a especímenes de R. paranensis encontrados en la cavidad corporal de Cyphocarax platana del río Paraná, distinguiéndolo del género Artystone Schioedte 1866 por el pleon y pleotelson fusionados en una sola unidad en hembras adultas. En la actualidad, Riggia incluye cinco especies [9] y ha sido reportado en la cuenca del río Paraná en Brasil y en la cuenca del río Meta en Colombia (Tabla 1). En la presente nota damos a conocer el primer caso de parasitismo de Riggia sp. en peces de agua dulce de Ecuador, provenientes de la región amazónica del país.Los peces hospederos fueron obtenidos mediante colecciones de oportunidad, con una atarraya de 20 libras con ojo de malla de 20 mm, sacrificados con benzocaína al 10 % y fijados en formol al 10 %. Posteriormente, se identificaron las muestras y sus isópodos fueron removidos y fijados en etanol al 75 %. La colecta, fijación y montaje de los parásitos se basó en Eiras et al. [23]. Las medidas fueron tomadas con un calibrador digital Buffalo Tools (± 0.01 mm), y el peso con una balanza analítica Fisher Scientific (± 0.001 gr). Los especímenes de Riggia sp., se encuentran depositados en la colección

The Amazon forest has the highest biodiversity on earth. However, information on Amazonian vertebrate diversity is still deficient and scattered across the published, peer-reviewed and grey literature and in unpublished raw data. Camera traps are an effective non-invasive method of surveying vertebrates, applicable to different scales of time and space. In this study, we organized and standardized camera trap records from different Amazon regions to compile the most extensive dataset of inventories of mammal, bird and reptile species ever assembled for the area. The complete dataset comprises 154,123 records of 317 species (185 birds, 119 mammals and 13 reptiles) gathered from surveys from the Amazonian portion of eight countries (Brazil,