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Thread: Vietnam rasboras??

  1. #1
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    Vietnam rasboras??

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    Anyone knows other then boraras uropthalmoides, and boraras maculatus,

    what other rasboras can be found in Vietnam? other kind of fishes?

    That was the 2 kinds that i observed were present when i was there.

    Thanks!
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    do not do to others what you will not want done to you!

    be kind! =)

  2. #2
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    Errrhh just out of curiousity.....why the interest in Vietnamese Rasboras?...Vietnamese Biotope by any chance?
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    The title below my name does not make me a guru...listen at your own risk!...

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    Vietnam is an interesting country, in that it is long and thin, basically can roughly divide it into south as Mekong drainage type, and the north possibly dominated by the Yunan highland type geography. I have come across very little in way of ornamental fishes from North Vietnam, as a wild guess I would suspect it similar to the Yunan plateau/Myanmar highland, maybe lots of danio-type fishes?

    In the south should be the same biotope as Cambodia/Eastern Thailand since the Mekong drains the entire lowland basin.

    There is the work by Rainboth (1996) which appears to be a definitive field reference called "Fishes of the Cambodian Mekong". I'd bet this would be very applicable to South Vietnam. One of the rasbora named is Trigonostigma espei the lambchop rasbora. Since this fish is found from Southeastern Thailand through to Cambodia, you'd probably find it in South Vietnam too.

    why I don't do garden hybrids and aquarium strains: natural species is a history of Nature, while hybrids are just the whims of Man.
    hexazona · crumenatum · Galleria Botanica

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    BTW did you mean you observed the B. maculatus in the wild in Vietnam? Which part? Also there are undescribed Boraras species from the Indochina region, perhaps they look similar. Reason for the doubt is the B. maculatus appears to be more Sundaic (i.e. Sumatra, Java, Kalimantan, Malay peninsula, and associated islands) in distribution. You also see this in the Trigonostigma distribution, the T. heteromorpha is Sundaic, while the previously mentioned T. espei is Indochinese (Mekong) in distribution.

    Fishes tend to be distributed along major drainage systems. In the last ice-age (10-20,000 years ago) the Sunda region is a single landmass linked by a connected drainage system (saw a map once from the Molluscan website) so that's why our local fishes can be found all over Malaya, Sumatra and Kalimantan.
    why I don't do garden hybrids and aquarium strains: natural species is a history of Nature, while hybrids are just the whims of Man.
    hexazona · crumenatum · Galleria Botanica

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    David: Yupz, i am setting up a Vietnamese biotope tank. It would be to recreate a scene where a mountain stream irrigates a paddy field. There I saw Limnophila aromatic, Java Fern, Clamps of Java moss, Cyperus helferi, blyxa japonica, c. balansae and marselia crenata. Most are growing emerse cause it is the dry season. L. Aromatic, cyperus, marselia and eleocharis are weeds in the paddy fields. L. Aromatic is also used as a herb in the village that i was at.

    hwchoy: i was in central vietnam, somewhere about 80km south of Hanoi. i do not doubt that i might have observed wrongly about B.maculatus. As we all know, there seems to be variants to this species. However, the ones that i saw have certain characteristics that are strikingly similar like the location of the 3 spots of the body.

    i do wonder if espei can be found there as i have pondered and done some research on this fish, but there are no conclusive evidence that states it's presence in Vietnam unfortunately. i do see some loaches there as well which i suspect to be botia sidthimunki.
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    mmm… need to go check out the atlas, but given Vietnam is about 1000 km end to end, 80km south of Hanoi would still fall under the Northern region, i.e. not in the Mekong part of the drainage. Thailand is actually not so far away from Vietnam as Laos is also long and narrow country.

    You're right about the Boraras, in fact I have some B. brigittae that has the stripe broken and some what on the way towards the B. merah form. But again all of these are Sundaic.

    Suggest you check out www.fishbase.org for the occurrence records.
    why I don't do garden hybrids and aquarium strains: natural species is a history of Nature, while hybrids are just the whims of Man.
    hexazona · crumenatum · Galleria Botanica

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    Thanks, will go check it out!

    it might be Northern Vietnam, cause that what our interpreters say, but funnily, the villagers seems to think they are in central vietnam because that's what they say. but it is pretty cool there so my suspicion is that you might be right!

    cheers!
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    do not do to others what you will not want done to you!

    be kind! =)

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    Central Vietnam should be somewhere around Hue or Danang. But what is the local people like, are they more fair-skinned like Chinese or dark-skinned like Thai/Khmer? You'd also notice that of the Vietnamese, the north are just like Chinese, with Chinese-style cuisine, talks slower (vs the south). Whereas the southerners talk very fast, the accent is different enough that they have to pay attention to what each other is saying, and the cuisine is a lot like thai food.

    I spend quite a bit of time in the two major cities back in mid-90s, but didn't get to see much of the country-side unfortunately. The only aquarium fish I saw was a HUGE arowana inside a shop house in HCMC. Wonder if they have any Betta there.
    why I don't do garden hybrids and aquarium strains: natural species is a history of Nature, while hybrids are just the whims of Man.
    hexazona · crumenatum · Galleria Botanica

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    if you do a biotope like you'd probably want to have lots of loaches! And don't forget the rice-fish Oryzias sp., fishbase list the followings as occuring in the Mekong/Indochina region:
    • O. curvinotus
    • O. haugiangensis
    • O. javanicus
    • O. mekongensis
    • O. minutillus
    • O. pectoralis
    • O. sinensis

    and there is a long list of Rasboras and Puntius as well, and even the Asian Bony Tongue (Arowana). Here's some illustrations:

    Oryzias javanicus


    Oryzias mekongensis


    Rasbora aurotaenia


    Rasbora daniconius


    Rasbora dusonensis


    Rasbora paviei


    Scleropages formosus
    why I don't do garden hybrids and aquarium strains: natural species is a history of Nature, while hybrids are just the whims of Man.
    hexazona · crumenatum · Galleria Botanica

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    btw, tonight 2300 on Animal Planet there is a program on Vietnam. The Natural World: Vietnam, The Country Not The War. Probably wouldn't see any fishes but hopefully some river biotopes.
    why I don't do garden hybrids and aquarium strains: natural species is a history of Nature, while hybrids are just the whims of Man.
    hexazona · crumenatum · Galleria Botanica

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    choy, u got pm
    人的一生﹐ 全靠奮斗﹐ 唯有奮斗﹐ 才能成功

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    ----------------
    On 6/24/2003 7:39:53 AM

    i do wonder if espei can be found there as i have pondered and done some research on this fish, but there are no conclusive evidence that states it's presence in Vietnam unfortunately. i do see some loaches there as well which i suspect to be botia sidthimunki.
    ----------------
    checkerboard, I am keen to hear about your comments or ideas about the espei. There was an article on www.siamensis.org about going to Chantaburi province to look for this fish, and also Biotope's stock of T. espei was stated as having come from Koh Ngam, a small island near the tourist island of Koh Chang (think it means elephant island) in Trat province (next to Chantaburi), which is adjacent to Cambodia on the Gulf of Thailand coast.
    why I don't do garden hybrids and aquarium strains: natural species is a history of Nature, while hybrids are just the whims of Man.
    hexazona · crumenatum · Galleria Botanica

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    sorry to be so chatty, but since checkerboard mentioned Boraras urophthalmoides here's some tidbit: remember the recent arrest of terrorists in southern Thailand from the town of Narathiwat? Well, guess what? The type locality (i.e. where the particular specimen designated as representative of the species, called the type specimen, came from) is 43km north of the town of Narathiwat, in a swamp area near the mouth of the Sai Buri river. [:] well thought it might be fun to know. [:] oh, for those unfamiliar, this is the so called exclamation-point rasbora, can you guess why?



    why I don't do garden hybrids and aquarium strains: natural species is a history of Nature, while hybrids are just the whims of Man.
    hexazona · crumenatum · Galleria Botanica

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    Using fishbase.org, it states that rasboras espei can be found in Vietnam around the Mekong delta.

    As for whether it can be found in Koh Ngam, I do not dispute the possibility because of the proximity to Thailand, but whether it is native or introduced is disputable. It’s like there are fishes found in johor that are not found in Singapore because there is a water barrier though we are so close. . Nevertheless, the chances that fishes that can survive in johor, can likely do so in Singapore if introduced. Hence the logic applies.

    Another point is that, small island has only a small ecosystem. Assuming that all rivers flow into the sea or something, the salinity would be higher in the lowland rivers. Therefore unless it is further upstream, the fish wouldn’t be able to survive (though some sources claim that espei can be found in coastal mangrove swamps). And if it is found upstream, then how big a population can it sustain given that the amount of “upstream space” in a small island is likely to be limited. Just my thoughts…

    Anyway, I cant access www.siamensis.org, so I cant check out more on the article and thanks for the information you have provided hwchoy. anyway chantaburi is pretty close to the island of koh chang, and it is within the mainland, so in all possibilities, they will enjoy some success there. Really appreciated it and enjoyed learning from you!
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    be kind! =)

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    checkerboard, I am repeat what I have read, just sharing lah. Although I am quite careful to state whether I heard/read it somewhere, or whether I speculate, or where I know it as a fact. Sometimes we get all confused as people repeat someone's "guess" as fact.

    Anyway, siamensis.org is a very nice site, unfortunately 90% of the content is in Thai. The pictures are worth having a look, especially those of the countryside and biotope. Several articles are in English, of which one of them has the author stating that T. espei is caught and exported in large numbers from that region, although he only managed to catch a few. He was actually there to find the Betta prima for which that area is the type locality. Some very nice pics. You should try to access again later, I think there is some problem with the domain ownership.

    Did you catch the Vietnam documentory on Animal Planet? As usual nothing much on fishes, only showed one muddle with lots of cyprinid-like fishes from the top, that's all. []
    why I don't do garden hybrids and aquarium strains: natural species is a history of Nature, while hybrids are just the whims of Man.
    hexazona · crumenatum · Galleria Botanica

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    BTW, don't trust all the records in fishbase.org, some of them are clearly dubious.
    why I don't do garden hybrids and aquarium strains: natural species is a history of Nature, while hybrids are just the whims of Man.
    hexazona · crumenatum · Galleria Botanica

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    nope, i didnt watch animal planet last nite unfortunately.

    anyway, you mentioned that you stayed in Vietnam for a while.
    did you go to the famous perfume pagoda???

    you will notice that there the boat trip there takes you through a river filled with vallisneria, cyperus, myriophyllum (probably introduced) and there is lots of cyprinids fishes! especially near the shallows. you can actually see them using discarded drink cans (yes, irresponsible tourist) as "homes" as they dart in and out of them!

    i love vietnam!
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    do not do to others what you will not want done to you!

    be kind! =)

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    I didn't "stay" in Vietnam as in living there, but I had two offices in Hanoi and HCMC, and I shuttle up from Singapore and between them on projects and customer calls. This is in 1995/96 so things must have changed quite a bit. In those days Hanoi don't have traffic lights and Noi Bai airport terminal looks like those building in Demsey Road CMPB!

    Nice charming country.

    Anyway I didn't get to see any countryside, other than speeding through it on the highway in my limo [:] The most fun was the expense claim part, once I had to make a claim for Ð10,000,000 which is less than US$1,000 but the number of digits managed to overflow the input field for the expense program
    why I don't do garden hybrids and aquarium strains: natural species is a history of Nature, while hybrids are just the whims of Man.
    hexazona · crumenatum · Galleria Botanica

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    erh checkerboard, ... sidthimunkis are not found in vietnam. their home region is in the western province of Kanchanaburi, Thailand. the main rivers where they can be found are the Kwai Yai and Kwai Noi if i'm not wrong. but they're somewhat close to extinction in the wild, due to hydroelectric projects and pollution of their native rivers. a similar species is Botia nigrolineata, from the Nan River system further north in Thailand. these are somewhat larger. the loaches u saw in Vietnam might be those of the Sinibotia or perhaps Nemacheilus or Shistura species. the fish fauna in northern Vietnam should be the same as those found in Yunnan province, China, whereas the fishes of southern and central Vietnam should somewhat be the same as what u can find in Cambodia and Laos, since various river systems (in this case the Mekong and its tributaries) criss-cross these countries.
    Fish.. Simply Irresistable
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    oh yes, just before i forget, i have some Boraras micros from Sakhon Nakhon, Thailand. this is a province in Northeastern Thailand if i'm not wrong, close to Laos and perhaps Cambodia. if B. micros is found in this area then it is possible that u saw B. micros in Vietnam.

    well, this is a list of species found in Indochina, as listed from Brittan's book on Rasboras.

    1) rasbora argyrotaenia
    2) rasbora aurotaenia
    3) sundadanio axelrodi
    4) rasbora dusonensis
    5) trigonostigma espei
    6) rasbora hobelmani
    7) rasbora myersi
    rasbora pavei
    9) rasbora spilocerca
    10) rasbora steineri
    11) rasbora sumatrana
    12) rasbora tornieri
    13) boraras urophthalmoides
    14) boraras micros
    Fish.. Simply Irresistable
    Back to Killies... slowly.

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