![]() ![]() Mekong giant catfish are now successfully bred in Thailand, they are often hybridised with the iridescent shark to make the Mekong iridescent shark. One scientific study found zooplankton and phytoplankton in their stomach contents. The Mekong giant catfish are toothless herbivores that live off of the plants and algae in the river. The fish likely obtains its food from algae growing on submerged rocky surfaces, as it does not have any sort of dentition. After about one year, the fish becomes herbivorous, feeding on filamentous algae, probably ingesting larvae and periphyton accidentally. Feeding Īs fry, this species feeds on zooplankton in the river and is known to be cannibalistic. Overfishing, damming, destruction of spawning, and breeding grounds and siltation have taken a toll on the species' habitat. Fragmentation caused by infrastructure development of dams are becoming increasingly common posing threats to larval fish and reducing breeding abilities. Spawning fish in the upper Cambodia are being over harvested. The fish are thought to rear primarily in the Mekong and Cambodia's Tonle Sap lake and migrate hundreds of miles north to spawning grounds in Thailand. Understanding of the species’ migration pattern is incomplete. A 150 kg individual was found in a Kelantan river in Malaysia, it is believed to have been released illegally. Today, however, essentially no sightings are reported outside of the main Mekong river channel and the Tonle Sap region. In the past, fishers have reported the fish in a number of the Mekong's tributaries. They live primarily in the main channel of the river, where the water depth is over 10 m (33 ft), while researchers, fishermen and officials have found this species in the Tonle Sap River and Lake in Cambodia, a UNESCO Biosphere Reserve. Fish congregate during the beginning of the rainy season and migrate upstream to spawn. It is now believed to only exist in small, isolated populations in the middle Mekong region. Due to threats, this species no longer inhabits the majority of its original habitat. ![]() ![]() Historically, the fish's natural range reached from the lower Mekong in Vietnam (above the tidally influenced brackish water of the river's delta) all the way to the northern reaches of the river in the Yunnan Province of China, spanning almost the entire 4,800 km (3,000 mi) length of the river. Although research projects are currently ongoing, relatively little is known about this species. The Mekong giant catfish is a threatened species in the Mekong, and conservationists have focused on it as a flagship species to promote conservation on the river. Mekong Giant Catfish, gifted to Japan by Thailand, on display at Nagasaki Penguin Aquarium Distribution and habitat Thai fisheries officials stripped the giant catfish, caught in 2005, of its eggs as part of a breeding program, intending then to release it, but the fish died in captivity and was sold as food to local villagers. This specimen, caught in 2005, was widely recognized as the largest entirely freshwater fish ever caught (the largest sturgeon species can far exceed this size, but they are anadromous), until surpassed in June of 2022 by a giant freshwater stingray specimen caught in Cambodia. The largest catch recorded in Thailand since record-keeping began in 1981 was a female measuring 2.7 m (8 ft 10 in) in length and weighing 293 kg (646 lb). It can reportedly weigh up to 350 kg (770 lb). Attaining a length of up to 3 m (9.8 ft), the Mekong giant catfish grows extremely quickly, reaching a mass of 150 to 200 kg (330 to 440 lb) in only six years. In 2005, the Mekong giant catfish attained the Guinness World Record' for the world's largest freshwater fish. Mekong giant catfish are one of the largest species of freshwater fish. Young Mekong catfish do exhibit barbels and oral teeth, but these features diminish as they age and are absent by the time they grow to be 30-50cm in length. Grey to white in color and lacking stripes, the Mekong giant catfish is distinguished from other large catfish species in the river by the near-total lack of barbels and the absence of teeth. Depiction of a mature Mekong giant catfish from the Illustrated collection of fishes from Asia, Africa and Australia ![]()
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