Esmaeilius persicus (Jenkins, 1910)
Maharlo killifish, Farsi tooth-carp
Taxonomy & Nomenclature
Synonym/s: Cyprinodon persicus Jenkins, 1910; Aphanius farsicus Teimori, Esmaeili & Reichenbacher, 2011
Conservation Status
Extinct in the Wild (Freyhof et al., 2025; Jouladeh-Roudbar & Freyhof, 2026)
Last wild record: 2013 (Freyhof et al., 2025); c.2015 (Jouladeh-Roudbar & Freyhof, 2026)
IUCN RedList status: Extinct in the Wild
Distribution & Habitat
Maharlo Lake basin, Iran
Anatomy & Morphology
Biology & Ecology
Hypodigm
Media
References
Original scientific description:
Jenkins, J. T. (1910). Notes on fish from India and Persia, with descriptions of new species. 1. On a collection of fishes made by W. T. Blanford in 1872 in Persia and Baluchistan. Records of the Indian Museum 5: 123-128.
Other references:
Alcaraz, Carles et al. (2015). Herbivory and seasonal changes in diet of a highly endemic cyprinodontid fish (Aphanius farsicus). Environ. Biol. Fish. 98: 1541-1554.
Amin, Omar M. et al. (2013). The Description and Host–Parasite Relationships of a New Quadrigyrid Species (Acanthocephala) from the Persian Tooth-Carp, Aphanius farsicus (Actinoptreygii: Cyprinodontidae) in Iran. J. Parasitol. 99(2): 257-263.
Coad, B. W. (1998). Systematic biodiversity in the freshwater fishes of Iran. Ital. J. Zool. 65: 101-108.
Esmaeili, Hamid Reza and Freyhof, Jörg. (2014). Aphanius farsicus might be extinct in the wild. Saving Freshwater Fishes and Habitats 4: 30.
Esmaeili, Hamid Reza, Masoudi M., Ebrahimi M., Elmi A. (2016). Review of Aphanius farsicus: a critically endangered species (Teleostei: Cyprinodontidae) in Iran. Iranian Journal of Ichthyology 3(1): 1-18. https://doi.org/10.22034/iji.v3i1.112 [automatic download]
Esmaeili, Hamid Reza et al. (2018). Checklist of freshwater fishes of Iran. FishTaxa 3(3): 1-95.
Esmaeili, H. R., Teimori, A., Zarei, F., Sayyadzadeh, G. (2020). DNA barcoding and species delimitation of the Old World tooth-carps, family Aphaniidae Hoedeman, 1949 (Teleostei: Cyprinodontiformes). PLoS ONE 15(4): e0231717.
Freyhof, Jörg, Yoğurtçuoğlu, Baran, Jouladeh-Roudbar, Arash and Kaya, Cüneyt. (2025). Handbook of Freshwater Fishes of West Asia. Berlin & Boston: De Gruyter. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783111677811 [pp. 739-741]
Gholami Z., Esmaeili H.R., Erpenbeck D., Reichenbacher B. (2015). Genetic connectivity and phenotypic plasticity in the cyprinodont Aphanius farsicus from the Maharlu Basin, south-western Iran. Journal of Fish Biology 86(3): 882-906. https://doi.org/10.1111/jfb.12599
Jouladeh-Roudbar, A. and Freyhof, J. (2026). Esmaeilius persicus. The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species 2026: e.T218579451A218579511. https://dx.doi.org/10.2305/IUCN.UK.2026-1.RLTS.T218579451A218579511.en. Accessed on 22 July 2026.
Keivany, Y. and Esmaeili, H. R. (2013). Threatened fishes of the world: Aphanius farsicus Teimori, Esmaeili and Reichenbacher, 2011 (Cyprinodontidae). Croatian Journal of Fisheries 71(4): 192-194.
Masoudi, Mojtaba et al. (2021). Is the hybridization phenomenon traceable in the otolith and scale of extant Aphanius species? – A case study on hybrid offsprings of Aphanius farsicus X A. sophiae (Teleostei: Aphaniidae). Acta Zoologica 102(2): 182-191. https://doi.org/10.1111/azo.12326
Teimori, Azad et al. (2011). Aphanius farsicus, a replacement name for A. persicus (Jenkins, 1910) (Teleostei, Cyprinodontidae). Zootaxa 3096: 53-58.
Vahed, Nafiseh Sanjarani, Esmaeili, Hamid Reza, Masoudi, Mojtaba and Ebrahimi, Mehregan. (2017). Towards the conservation of a critically endangered species, Aphanius farsicus: embryogenesis and development. Environmental Biology of Fishes 101: 193-202. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10641-017-0691-1
Vahed, Nafiseh Sanjarani, Esmaeili, Hamid Reza, Masoudi, Mojtaba and Reichenbacher, Bettina. (2018). Early otolith development in the critically endangered tooth-carp, Aphanius farsicus (Teleostei: Cyprinodontidae). Environmental Biology of Fishes 101: 1309-1317. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10641-018-0778-3
https://extinctanimals.proboards.com/thread/18084/aphanius-farsicus