New species of walking catfish trey andaing discovered in Vietnam and Cambodia

Thursday, 24 November 2011
By Serath

PHNOM PENH, (Cambodia Herald) - A fish resembling the slender walking catfish (Clarias niehofii), known as trey andaing ngaing in Khmer, has been found to be a new species from the Clarias genus of walking catfishes, the largest genus in the Clariidae family of airbreathing catfishes.

Specimens of the fish were collected by Nguyen Van Tu of the Faculty of Fisheries at Nong Lam University in Ho Chi Minh City during an ichthyological survey of Phu Quoc island off the southeast coast of Cambodia which is is administered as part of Kien Giang province in the Mekong Delta.

Tu and two colleagues, Ng Heok Hee from the Raffles Museum of Biodiversity Research in Singapore and Dang Khanh Hong of the Agriculture and Fisheries Extension Center in Kien Giang, have subsequently described the new species in a paper that appeared in the taxonomy journal Zootaxa earlier this year.

In the paper, the authors noted that the new species, which they have named Clarias gracilentus, is also found in southeastern Cambodia and brings to 20 the number of Clarias species recognized in Southeast Asia out of 56 species worldwide, mostly in Africa.
The paper said that the Southeast Asian species were divided into two species complexes based on their body forms. The slender walking catfish complex of elongated eel-like walking fishes now includes the new species as well as Clarias nigricans, discovered in the Mahakam River Basin in the Indonesian part of the island of Borneo in 2003, and Clarias pseudonieuhofii, which was discovered in Borneo in 2004.

Vietnamese news reports say the provincial Department of Science and Technology in Kien Giang, which borders the Cambodian provinces of Kampot and Kep, has allocated almost USD 10,000 to study the new species to see if it is suitable for breeding.

Other species from the Clarius genus are widely farmed across the Mekong region including a popular hybrid fish which is a cross between a local species and the North African catfish (Clarias gariepinus), known as trey andaing afrik in Khmer.

The North African catfish was introduced from the Central African Republic to Vietnam in 1974 and from Vietnam to Cambodia in 1982. The species was also introduced from Vietnam to Laos in 1980 and from Laos to Thailand in 1987.