UNAIR NEWS – Arowana fish is often dubbed as the king of ornamental fish. Apart from its beautiful body color, arowana fish have a very high price and are rare to find. Arowana fish have various types that are scattered in the world, but the types that are most in demand by the public mostly come from Southeast Asia.
Indonesia has quite a variety of types of arowana, namely the Papuan arowana (Scleropages jardini); australian arowana (Scleropages leidcharti); super red arowana, banjar red arowana, red tail golden arowana, green arowana (Scleropages formosus).
According to Rendy Ginanjar S.Pi, M.Sc, as head of the arowana fish management team at the Ornamental Fish Cultivation Research Center (BRBIH), arowana super network become one of the focuses of research conducted by BRBIH. He conveyed this in the webinar 'Arwana Talk' which was initiated by the Faculty of Fisheries and Maritime Affairs (FPK) UNAIR and BRBIH Depok (9/8/2021). Some of the reasons are because the price is very attractive. Apart from that, physically this fish has a handsome appearance and is quite aggressive. So that the fish becomes an important ornamental fish commodity.
Reporting from the official website of KKP.go.id, in 2018 4.058 super red arowana fish were sold with a total price of more than 10 billion rupiah. Meanwhile, in 2019, 2.360 were sold for a total price of 2,5 billion rupiah. However, this fish has a threatened status due to capture and land change as well as environmental degradation.
Rendy also explained the relationship between arowana fish super network with Chinese ethnic mythology. When caring for this fish properly, it is believed to bring good luck and goodness to its owner.
"Therefore, this fish is very popular in countries with many ethnic Chinese, especially in Chinese areas," he explained.
Arowana fish cultivation itself is quite difficult and takes a long time. Sexual maturation or genitals from egg to adult takes 2-4 years. The number of eggs produced is also quite small, ranging from 20 to 90 eggs. Meanwhile, the time to incubate the eggs is also very long, which is generally around 50 days. In addition, another important obstacle is the identification process between males and females which are difficult to distinguish.
Darmawan Setia Budi S.Pi., M.Si, FPK UNAIR lecturer, explained that natural arowana fish spawning only occurs in July and November. But it can also be done outside the season provided it provides adequate nutrition. He also explained that the incubation time for fish eggs could be accelerated by placing the eggs in the incubator so that the broodstock could carry out the next reproductive process.
"So that it can overcome the limited number of parents, so the subsequent reproduction process can run faster," he explained at the 'Arwana Talk' event (9/8/2021).
Darmawan also introduced production engineering technology that can be carried out on arowana fish. The technology is a germ cell transplant that is used to get a host or surrogate mother. For example, for super red arowana fish that often experience reproductive problems, a replacement broodstock will be used using other types of arowana fish that are easy to reproduce.
"So he took the tissue from the super red arowana fish which was inserted (for example) into the silver arowana. So that later silver arowana fish can be developed which lay super red arowana fish eggs," he concluded.
Author: Muhammad Ichwan Firmansyah
Editor: Feri Fenoria
source: Development of Arowana Cultivation According to Researchers in Indonesia