Barbatula is a genus of fish in the family Nemacheilidae native to Europe and Asia.Kottelat, M. (2012): Conspectus cobitidum: an inventory of the loaches of the world (Teleostei: Cypriniformes: Cobitoidei). Raffles Bulletin of Zoology, Suppl. No. 26: 1-199. They are found in streams, rivers and lakes, and the genus also includes Europe's only cavefish, which only was discovered in the Danube–Aachtopf system in Germany in 2015.
Barbatula formerly included many more species, but these have been moved to other genera, notably Oxynoemacheilus.
Species These are the currently recognized species in this genus:
Barbatula altayensis S. Q. Zhu, 1992 Barbatula barbatula (Linnaeus, 1758) (Stone loach) Barbatula caucasica (Berg, 1898) Barbatula cobdonensis (Gundriser 1973) incertae sedis Barbatula compressirostris (Warpachowski, 1897) Barbatula conilobus Prokofiev, 2016 Barbatula dgebuadzei (Prokofiev, 2003) Barbatula dsapchynensis Prokofiev, 2016 Barbatula emuensis H. Chen, H. Zhang, Y. Chen & Freyhof, 2019 Barbatula fluvicola Calegari, Freyhof, Waldock, Wegscheider, Josi, Rüber & Seehausen, 2025 Barbatula gibba L. Cao, Causse & E. Zhang, 2012 Barbatula golubtsovi (Prokofiev, 2003) Barbatula hispanica (Lelek, 1987) Barbatula karabanowi Prokofiev, 2018 Barbatula kirinensis T.-L. Tchang, 1932 Barbatula leoparda Gauliard, Dettai, Persat, Keith & Denys, 2019 Barbatula liaoyangensis Chen, Zhang, Chen & Freyhof, 2019 Barbatula linjiangensis Chen, Zhang, Chen & Freyhof, 2019 Barbatula markakulensis (Men'shikov, 1939) Barbatula nuda (Bleeker, 1864) Barbatula ommata Calegari, Freyhof, Waldock, Wegscheider, Josi, Rüber & Seehausen, 2025 Barbatula oreas (D. S. Jordan & Fowler, 1903) Barbatula pechiliensis (Fowler, 1899) Barbatula potaninorum (Prokofiev, 2007) Barbatula restricta Prokofiev, 2015 Barbatula sawadai (Prokofiev, 2007) Barbatula selengensis Prokofiev, 2024 Barbatula sturanyi (Steindachner, 1892) Barbatula taurica (Kessler, 1877) Barbatula tomiana (Ruzsky (ru), 1920) Barbatula toni (Dybowski, 1869) Barbatula vardarensis (Karaman, 1928) Barbatula zetensis (Šorić, 2000) Barbatula zhangwuensis Chen, Zhang, Chen & Freyhof 2019 Synonyms Barbatula quignardi (Băcescu-Meşter, 1967); valid as B. barbatula References