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Cypselurus — Midas II
Published: 2014-12-06 05:48:10 +0000 UTC; Views: 1022; Favourites: 51; Downloads: 16
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Description
Asian Arowana (Scleropages formosus), Pet Market, ShanghaiScleropages formosus
Despite the fact that they are regarded by the Chinese as a 'dragon fish' and a bringer of luck, the fortunes of the wild Arowana have not been terribly auspicious. The damaging of their tropical river habitat in previous strongholds such as the Malay Peninsula have depleted the populations of this 'dragon fish', and the fact that it is widely sought after by aquarists from all across the world does not help its situation. However, with new fish-farming technology that may sate the need for wild-caught imports, the Asian Arowana may yet gain a bright future.
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This is an edit of a previous photo that I felt could do with a little touching up.
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Comments: 53
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The wild catch has been dropped to virtually zero, every one in the trade is captive-bred and microchipped to prevent laundering.
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That's news that can go either way, really, but thanks for informing me 
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Seeing as there have been a few wild-caught individuals that were smuggled (these people have been arrested) I dare say that the wild population is there.
Damming is probably a much larger disaster.
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Good to hear some of the wild population still holds on.
As it has been for many years as of late. :/ The Chinese Paddlefish, probably one of the greatest freshwater bony fish in Asia, is now annihilated from the Yangtze as a result of damming, as well as illegal hunting. Dams along the Yangtze are an increasingly pressing and irreversible issues along many stretches, it now seems..
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For the paddlefish you can just say extinct (although it is one that could theoretically be cloned into existence using its smaller, more peaceful American relative)
This was probably the first time a paddlefish was apex predator and we had to put its reign to a permanent end.
Two species down, eight to go for the Three Gorges dam.
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Cloning it back would definitely be an option, maybe later on, but only so if its habitat is somehow, with a miraculous change of heart and attitude in the Chinese government, restored. If it isn't, cloning it and releasing it back into the wild would only ensure it goes extinct a second time. There's just too many barriers in the way of that species successfully taking back its niche when so many prey species themselves are already badly diminished.
Seems like it. :/ Won't take long for the other few to fall, though..
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I know. Really that dam should be torn down.
How to wipe out 10 endangered species at once. Because that's what is happening. And Brazil is building one that would wipe out about 200 species at least.
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Definitely :/ Its just messing up the ecology of the entire river system, and that's on top of the pollution and the trash that's pumped and tossed into that river..
Yeah, I really hope that someone interferes to stop the building of that one...
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It begins this month. Probably too late to stop it.
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:/ What a great new year's gift for the world's conservationists...
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And it is only the first of several, all conveniently placed to block the Amazon't most important areas.
Seriously, dams even contribute to global warming. Who builds these things anymore?
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Isn't it just the best when people manage to do that? Sometimes I can't even tell if they're doing it on purpose, or that they're merely just purely by coincidence.
Everyone in biologically diverse/fragile/important areas, apparently..
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Hey, haven't caught up recently, wondering if you'e seen the latest season (last summer, I think) of River Monsters?
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It catapulted a huge amount of obscure, spectacular species into public knowledge. That has to help in some way to conservation.
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Good to hear that you thought that of it as well
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Maybe if he focused on freshwater apex predators instead of freshwater apex predators that can or have caused human fatalities...
It's one of the only shows worth watching on Animal Planet.
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I think he said somewhere that he would love to do that, but the premise of the show itself is more on the whole 'can injure a human thing'. I recall him stating somewhere that would love to have some other species, but there have been no records on them having inflicted injuries on humans, so... :/
Yeah, definitely.
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It's more of "have injured a human being", because he gave the sawfish (an apex predator obviously capable of killing people) a harmless verdict.
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i love arowana's!!!!
on venezuela there is a crap ton of them, sometimes when they are used to human contact the can be feed by hand and you can caress his abdomen without scaring them.
The are similar in attitude with the Oscar fish, a very polite fish of the cichildae family.
Although sometimes they can be aggressive and jump unbelievably high if the saw a prey outside the water.
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Wow, that must be awesome!
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well to be fair,i don't think size is not factor that reduce the jumping qualities of a fish!
i mean, look at the marlin fish! he is packs quite a ton more size than any species of arowanas.
and if you want to put it with a more smaller fish, the royal salmon can jump rivers with ease.
i think the jumping qualities of the fish are more related to the conditions where they live, if they live in a hostile environment for example, this could be a self defense mechanism.
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Ah, yes true!
Speaking of Arapaima, actually, have you got any in the wild in Venezuela?
And I've recently looked into and yes, the Asian Arowana does actually jump! www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ho1i1p…
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oh sure! in the amazon river i guess there should be quite a population, I've never seen one myself, and there is none of them on the acuariums or fish shops that i recall. but probably is because his enormous size.
although if i go to the amazon i will love to see it, there is several gigantic species of fish there.
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Marvelous work. You're a truly gifted artist, and your work is wonderful to see!
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Why hello there, you handsome arowana.
When I was young it was my dream to keep one of these fish. The dream didn't quite work out, as I got an oscar instead.
Such a shame that so many species of them are threatened or endangered, and that we're ruining their wild habitats.
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Haha Oscar are still pretty nice!
Yeah :/ Arowanas do have something going for them though- the fact that a lot of people like them and want them to be preserved. A lot of species, unfortunately, don't even have that..especially the lesser-known ones.
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What a lovely photo! The lighting is excellent. The blue glow really adds to the photo.
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I love Arrowanas. I have always wanted the South American silver.
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They are certainly gorgeous fish.
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Yes I agree. They are longer and just nicer looking.
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Their jumps out of water to catch insects are also pretty impressive..yet to see one do that though.
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Gotta love those Arowanas hehe.A little while ago,I was pondering the idea of getting one as a pet although since I don't have the money,I decided to pass haha.A "predator" themed aquarium would be nice for it but I decided to pass on the predator theme aquarium since large predatory fish are quite high maintenance ones so I'll just be sticking with my South American themed tank and soon-to-be Asian and African themed tanks as well.
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Haha yeah, they're definitely not a fish to actually go and buy if you don't have the money to get one 
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A few weeks ago,I also made it in my head that I would also buy a Senegal Bichir but unfortunately they're getting pretty hard to find in the pet stores that are found in my area.I chanced upon a pet store selling those guys but those on sale were already adults and pretty expensive so I discarded the idea of getting Senegal Bichirs and decided to get some Yoyo Loaches again,once the tank that I plan on putting them in gets fixed(the one that had a huge crack that I mentioned before).
Well as long as the fish in your aquarium get along well with each other,then it is fine.Right now I still have the same fish that I had when I started redesigning my aquarium to a South American themed one except that there are some changes in the tank.The tank now has 5 Bolivian Ram Cichlids(I plan on transferring two of them to the tank that I will be keeping the Loaches since these five individuals in the tank tend to bicker a lot.I think those were all males or all females since they don't have any obvious sexual differences) and I swapped the other angelfish in my tank(the koi and the black veil angels) for a trio of Silver Angelfish since they look a lot more like the wild-caught angelfish,with their silver bodies and black stripes.My 7 Bronze Corydoras Catfish are still very much in evidence(two of them appear to be showing spawning behavior) but now they also have 3 Sterbai Corydoras as companions(there used to be 5 but 2 died).I also added Panda Corydoras before but they all died because they weren't doing so well in the tank.And lastly,I also added one oddball of a fish several months ago into the tank: A Spotted Hoplosternum Catfish.It was a good addition to my tank and it got along well with the Corydoras.
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Pretty big!
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He/She is a real beauty.
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