Successful propagation of endangered coral fish

The National Center for Southern Freshwater Aquaculture has successfully bred the coral fish species, included in the World Red Book, and Vietnam is classified as "endangered".

Coral fish is a fish belonging to the family of carp but larger, from 5 to 6 years old to mature and weighs nearly 10 kg on average. In natural environments, fish weighs 20 kg or more. In the past, the households that raised coral for professional fishing, only one catch per year was enough to cover all the investment costs as well as the essential life of the family.

Master Thi Thanh Vinh, Chairman of the Program "Preserving freshwater fish gene source", said that for decades, no one has ever practiced fishing. Especially in the last 10 years, this fish almost disappears, sometimes people catch a small one with their fingers.

Coral fish.(Photo: 4so9.com)

Therefore, in order to conserve gene sources like fish this quarter, scientists have been very hard, sometimes it takes a few months to "negotiate" with people to buy a small coral fish.

After 3 years of collecting, breeding, purebred fish, the Center is raising 40 mature coral fish and successfully bred the F1 generation.

In addition, the Center has successfully bred nearly 10,000 sea bass fishes to be raised in households in Dong Nai and fish are growing well.

Vinh hopes that the farming will be successful, the Center will propagate and supply this species to farmers and the program will be successful beyond expectation.

In addition to successful breeding of coral fish, the Center also has a sperm bank of fish. The bank is currently storing the genes of 30 freshwater species in the Mekong Delta, many of which are in the Vietnam Red Book and the World.