Family: Percichthyidae
A peaceful carnivore percichthyidae from China, Russia, the Korean Peninsula — advanced care.
A Percichthyidae species: Siniperca chuatsi lives mid-water swimmer over large river channels with strong flow. Predatory — best kept singly or as a pair. Adults reach 49–70 cm. It is one of the aquarium-kept Siniperca species we profile, alongside Siniperca fortis, Siniperca knerii, Siniperca roulei.
Rarely. Mandarin fish are visual predators wired for live, moving prey. Success stories exist of conversion to tong-wiggled dead fish or gel diets, but plan on live feeding when you acquire one.
Quickly on adequate feeding — from fingerling size to 20 cm within a year or two, eventually 40–60 cm in large systems. Buy with its adult size in mind.
Only in very large systems with visual barriers. Conspecifics are both rivals and potential prey for a fish that ambushes anything the right size.
Roughly a third to half of its own body length — size prey accordingly, and note that it will tackle surprisingly large meals when hungry.
Yes, but it's specialists-only. Adults reach 49–70 cm with a 500 L floor — practically a big tank or pond. It accepts only live fish or fresh shrimp, and pellet training ranks among the hardest for piscivores. Decide first: can you supply live prey or frozen fish long-term? Its beauty scales with difficulty: vivid mottling, ambush posture, and lightning strikes make it a top-tier native display.
The name comes from its pattern: irregular dark spots scattered over a tan base, like fallen osmanthus blossoms. The epithet chuatsi derives from a Yangtze-region dialect. It's a prestige fish in Chinese freshwater aquaculture — the star of squirrel mandarin fish on the table, and one of the ultimate challenges for native-fish hobbyists in the tank. The Japanese 'motoketsugyo' references the pair-entwining behavior at spawning.
Fasting is the classic beginner wall. Probabilities: new-tank stress (a week of quiet plus a dark cave), wrong food (it knows only live fish or fresh shrimp; pellets are basically hopeless — training follows the long path of live → drifting dead → frozen), overheated water (appetite collapses above 26 °C; it's a sub-coldwater species), or internal parasites (chronic refusal with wasting). It fasts well — two weeks without food is safe — but beyond a month, intervene.
Strictly none. Its diet is fish, and any swallowable companion becomes food — its gape is astonishing, taking prey 60% of its body length. The only 'community' form: fish utterly beyond its power (adult arowana, large koi) in very large water. Standard practice is one solitary specimen to watch ambush hunting — everything else in the tank is food.
500 L is the floor; 800 L+ solo in practice. It's an ambush hunter that doesn't cruise distances but needs striking runway — both depth and length serve its charge. Aquascape: one dark den (its lair) plus open hunting ground with sparse background planting. It spends 90% of its time in the cave; when it emerges, it's killing time.
Sub-coldwater — comfortable from 4–22 °C, no heater needed, and summer heat demands cooling. What it truly fears is temperature swing: a 2 °C gap on change water can trigger stress-fasting. Winter appetite loss and reduced activity are normal rhythm — don't force-feed with heat. It wants neutral (pH 7.0–7.4), soft water (GH 2–5), matching its big-river home.