• Question: What is so special about the Mekong giant catfish?

    Asked by kamikaze to Zara on 21 Jun 2011.
    • Photo: Zara Gladman

      Zara Gladman answered on 21 Jun 2011:

      Hello kamikaze! 🙂

      Well, judging from the name… the Mekong giant catfish lives in the Mekong river! I’ve been to that river before when I was travelling in Thailand… unfortunately I didn’t see any giant catfish though 🙁 The fish is ‘endemic’ to the Mekong, which means you won’t find it anywhere else in the world!

      Why is it so special? Well, the Guinness Book of Records lists the Mekong giant catfish as the BIGGEST freshwater fish species, ever! It can reach up to 3 metres in length. Last November, a British fisherman caught a fish that weighed 260 lbs (that’s over 18 stone, or 118 kilos!). Check this out:

      Why else is this fish special? Well, the IUCN Red List (which is a big list of species that are endangered) classifies the giant catfish as “Critically Endangered” (Link here: http://www.iucnredlist.org/apps/redlist/details/15944/0 ) – which means that fish numbers are decreasing and it is in danger of extinction.

      The biggest threat to these animals is overfishing. In the future, the species may also be threatened by the building of a dam in the river, which will stop the fish from migrating to breed.

      Hopefully conservationists and fishery managers will be able to save this species from extinction. There is information on conservation of Mekong giant catfish on the World Wildlife Fund website here: http://wwf.panda.org/who_we_are/wwf_offices/laos/projects/index.cfm?uProjectID=9S0790

      I also found a gallery of photos here: http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2005/06/photogalleries/giantcatfish/index.html – people in the fishery department in Thailand were trying to catch a giant catfish and take its eggs for rearing in captivity (where they’d be safer than in the wild… kind of like the project I’d like to do with trout eggs if I win!) but unfortunately the mother fish died before they could do it.

      It’s a pretty cool species 🙂 where did you hear about it?

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