By: John R. Platt
On December 23, a new species was found which was originally predicted to be no more. (Platt) This fish is called the Mangarahara cichlid (Ptychochromis insolitus). This fish is originally only found off of Madagascar. This species is extremely rare and most of the species had been destroyed. After this devastation, there were only three male fish remaining, representing this species. In order to help this species, the London Zoo Aquarium and Berlin Zoo sent out a note to other aquariums asking if any of them had any females of this species to see if this female needed a male to mate with. There was not much hope and when searching for a female. Then, "the Zoological Society of London announced that a group of Mangarahara cichlids has indeed been found. Not only that, they were actually still living in the wild". (Platt 1).
The person who got back to the Society of London was a business owner who had remembered and had seen the fish once before in a Madagascar town. (Platt) So, "An exploratory expedition was arranged with the vital support from HM Ambassador in the British Embassy of Madagascar, so that, along with aquarists from Toronto Zoo in Canada, Brian Zimmerman and Kienan Parbles from ZSL London Zoo could head off to Madagascar to search for the Mangarahara cichlid". (Platt 1). The teams searching everywhere to find the cichlid. They were able to use nets from local villagers and finally found the remaining cichlids. (Platt)
http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/extinction-countdown/2013/12/23/greatest-conservation-success-2013/
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