Gourami, Giant

The Giant Gourami is an extremely beautiful and ornamental fish found throughout South East Asia and is found in Malaysia, Indonesia, Indo-china and Thailand.
The Giant Gourami lives in freshwater and sometimes brackish water conditions favouring swamps, slow moving rivers and large lakes.
The Giant Gourami is a curious fish with the male at the time of spawning builds underwater bubble nests from weed and twigs in which the female then lays eggs.
The Giant Gourami is easily identifiable with an overly pronounced forehead and pair of long sensory barbels protruding from its chin with thick pronounced lips and small eyes.
This species has pale to golden yellow with silvery blue stripes running vertically along its body which is covered with small diamond shaped scaling and also can display a pink and black blotched colouration in many instances.
The Giant Gourami has large ornamental flared anal and dorsal fins with a small rounded caudal fin (tail).
The omnivorous Giant Gourami feeds on assorted zooplankton and various other aquatic plantlife, fruits and vegetation that is found in the freshwater lakes and rivers of South East Asia.
The shy and reclusive Giant Gourami is not one of Thailand’s better known freshwater monster fish species and is more commonly seen in freshwater aquariums and restaurants.
The Giant Gourami is caught with regularity by recreational anglers fishing in Thailand with cereal and paste baits float fished quietly in the margins.