Cryptic Photo Quiz

Cryptic Photo Quiz by gentle lemur posted 13 Nov 2017 at 6:13 PM

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Churchill once said that Russia's policy was like "a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma". Since MagpieGoose solved the last quiz so easily, I have followed Churchill's formula in this one.
First you have to solve the enigma by identifying the 10 species shown above (there is no need to worry about subspecies). Then there is the mystery of finding the links between them. Finally you have to solve the riddle and explain how you reached your answer.
After Kakapo's comment last time, I have taken care to make this puzzle fairer. If your English is good enough to read and understand this question, it is more than good enough to find the answer; although everyone will need some knowledge of other areas to make progress.
I'm not going to give any hints yet, but I will confirm the identities of the species involved as they emerge.
Have fun!

 

1. Tamandua
2. ??
3. Collared finchbill
4. Onager
5. ??
6. Helmeted currasow
7. Narrow-striped boky-boky
8. Silver moony
9. Mudskipper
10. Black rhino

 

1 tamandua
2 Bandula barb
3 collared finchbill
4 onager
5 grass liazrd
6 northern helmeted curassow
7 narrow-striped mongoose
8 silver moonfish
9 Pearse's dwarf mudskipper
10 easern black rhinoceros

 

Good question!
It has to be absolutely specific: so mudskipper by itself isn't good enough, neither is grass lizard. So any of the silver mono etc answers are equally satisfactory.

 

bongorob has 2 wrong and 1 insufficient (as above).

 

1. Southern tamandua
2. Tiger barb?
3. Collared finchbill
4. Onager
5. Six-lined grass lizard
6. Northern helmeted curassow
7. Narrow-striped mongoose
8. Silver moony
9. Dwarf Indian mudskipper
10. Eastern black rhino

 

SJ13 has 8 correct - there are several tiger barbs

 

I would've had number 2 as a five-banded barb Desmopuntius pentazona (I have some in my own collection) rather than a tiger barb (likewise) of which I thought there was only one species.

 

Close, but no cigar!
But I think that you are probably correct that tetrazona is the only true tiger barb, but the term has been applied more loosely to several species. I have seen pentazona called the 5-banded tiger barb.
Precision is needed to solve this problem

 

Six-banded then, Desmopuntius hexazona. Depending on the specimen they're always hard to tell apart.

 

Yes! They are tricky, which is why I checked carefully before posting.
Only species number 6 left to be identified.

 

Horned, or southern helmeted, curassow

 

Yes

So the complete list is:
1 southern tamandua (Howletts)
2 6 banded barb (Chester)
3 collared finchbill (Newquay)
4 Asian wild ass (Chester, it is an onager, but who would have known it wasn't a kulan?)
5 6 lined grass lizard (Chester)
6 southern helmeted curassow (Lotherton)
7 narrow-striped mongoose (Newquay)
8 Malayan angelfish (The Deep)
9 Pearse's mudskipper (Chester)
10 black rhino (Chester)

I don't think that was too hard. But what do they have in common? And what is the answer to the hidden riddle?

 

I was going to say that they are all kept in no more than 30 zoos in Europe (according to ZTL) but annoyingly the silver moony destroys that hypothesis

 

Or maybe it's that each one is kept in 10 or less zoos in the UK?

 

There are so many species on that list! I would have been spoiled for choice. There is quite a long list of species that are only kept at one zoo, so I might file that idea away for future use. But you'll have to keep thinking.

 

Because it was you combined with the fact there are hardly any kulan in western Europe and certainly not in the UK

 

I think I have photos of kulan in my collection taken at Chester and Whipsnade and I certainly have several from Colwyn Bay, although I grant you that they were taken some time before I took this photo of an onager in 2006.

 

Is the theme that all their scientific names have Latin Greek number references in them?