Fish Emperor - a new environmental disaster in Tri An Lake

Due to economic needs, some people living in Tri An reservoir area (Vinh Cuu district, Dong Nai province) have built ponds for native fish species and environmental disasters began to occur. Currently the most significant disaster is from Emperor fish (Lake fisherman named), imported from South America.

Emperor fish is sold at Vinh An market.(Photo: Labor)

The emperor's fish name is Peacock Bass , the scientific name Cichla ocellaris , belongs to the family of the Cichlidae Emperor and Perciformes Sea bass . This species is often found in freshwater areas. However, they also have salinity tolerance of 18 / oo (18 per thousand). And of course, like most species of the Cichlidae family, Emperor fish divide territory and are very aggressive.

Fish Emperor is carnivorous. They catch prey thanks to the fast chasing speed, as opposed to the ambush predatory commonly found in other carnivorous fishes. In Vietnam, their food is usually small fish such as Sesame, White fish, Tong fish . With such a fast, compact prey attack, the potential risk of some native species extinction is only a matter of time.

Fishermen at Tri An reservoir said that the Emperor's fish began to appear much from September to October 2006. So far, this species has grown quite strong.

(Photo: Labor)

According to Phung My Trung, who runs the Vietnam Forest Biology website , in November 2006, the captured individual is only about 10-14cm in size. The number of catches is very rare in hundreds of kilograms of bait fish (small fish used as bait for snakehead fish). But on March 3, 2007, the largest individual caught the weight of 0.83kg, about 100-140cm long.

In addition, the Emperor's fish were present throughout markets around the region. Who needs to go to Vinh An market to buy easily up to a few dozen kg of this fish.

The Emperor's fish can reach this size. (Photo: Labor)

Thus, from the fact that they reproduce very quickly due to abundant food sources, proper living environment, and through scientific documents, Mr. Trung affirmed the risk of overwhelming, spreading of this exotic fish. Compared with native fish species is very large. New environmental catastrophes can happen, such as the epidemic of yellow snail, bird fish, glassfish .

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