Hypoptopoma is a genus of freshwater ray-finned fishes belonging to the family Loricariidae, the mailed catfishes, and the subfamily Hypoptopomatinae, the cascudinhos. The catfishes in this genus are found in South America.
Taxonomy Hypoptopoma was first proposed as a monospecific genus in 1868 by the German-born British ichthyologist and herpetologist Albert Günther when he described Hypoptopoma thoracatum. Günther gave H. thoracatum'''s type locality as Xeberos in the upper Amazon of Peru. This genus is the type genus of the subfamily Hypoptopomatinae, which is classified in family Loricariidae in the Neotropical catfish suborder Loricarioidei.
SpeciesHypoptopoma contains the following valid species:
DistributionHypoptopoma'' species inhabit the drainage basins to the east of the Andes, except for river systems draining to the Atlantic between the mouth of the Amazon River in Brazil and the Paraná River in Argentina.
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