FISHIOLOGY

When I was working at Sarawak back in 1997 - 2000 near Bakun dam project, Ive heard from my Indonesia fren tat there exist a type of marulioides that is red in color. Initially I tot they were just tall tale until a few other spoke of the same fish. Unfortunately no pic was provided and only a vague description of the fish was given. After that I was back in KL,off and on I would try to find out more about the fish but it seem nobody from the peninsula had even heard of such a fish let alone seen one. And it happened someone posted a similar fish at Monsterfishkeeper forum back in the mid 2000 that the Japanese had acquired such a fish. That was the first time I had seen the sp Borneo. But it was out of touch. Fast forward to present day, again the sp Borneo bug had bitten me and this time I was determined to get one. Now with the internet technology I joined any available facebook fishing group in Indonesia and whenever an sp borneo was caught I would note down the location ...

I would like to highlight a story of a fish and unlike any other fish. Of the entire world they reside only in the peat swap of Terengganu and possibility around it's vicinity. The fish is known as the Toman Bunga var. Terengannu (梅花斑). The only variant of the species Channa Marulioides that produces a plum flower pattern on its body. And that was how the name Toman Bunga - Plum Flower Snakehead derived. Plum Flowers Take note that unlike common marulioides the terengannu var. white scales produce a plum flower image.The real sticking flower is as per picture is considered as the highest grade of the Toman Bunga. You can see a band of plum flowers strung together. The holy grail of the Toman Bunga. Pic courtesy of Nasir Jumat. Years of misinformation had messed up the perception of the flower pattern and Patel forming scale. No thanks to fish traders for confusing everybody. The common maruliodes white scales are hence considered as flowers. But obviously they shou...

Bought this Kali for experiment, as I noticed the band are unlike the regular 999 kali. Size is 3". I'm trying to see if somehow this can be the double line Channa sp Borneo.

I was informed that a batch of baby red maru arrived in Malaysia, and immediately went to checked out the fingerlings. Upon inspection the batch has 2 different variant 1 being the normal 999 kalimantan marulioides and another unidentified variant. So without thinking further I bought 1 baby for experiment. As you can see from the picture, the fish bars and fin pattern is unique, Ive never seen this variant and keeping my fingers crossed I hope this will turn out to be what I hope it is. Fish is 3" in size, first day in the tank it was attacked by my botia elongata at first I thought it wouldn't survived but this little fella was tough as hell. No medication was administered.