Siamese tigers....how to know for sure?

[Richard]

Just wondering with the Siamese Tigers you guys are talking about for sale...are they real Siamese Tigers? Because from what I gather... it is illegal to export Siamese Tigers from Thailand... so what we are getting now is actually mostly Indonesian (Borneo/Sumatran) Tigers or Cambodian Tigers... I think Siamese Tigers are protected species or something... quite hard to tell the difference though... some ppl around the world claim to be able to tell the difference... but I am not sure how accurate they would be...since there is no proper way to tell... some ppl say from the number of stripes on the body...some say the number of stripes on the tail...some say from the size of their eyes when they are young.... others say from the colouration... anyone on this forum know for sure?

[ajbroome]

Richard said...

> Just wondering with the Siamese Tigers you guys are talking

> about for sale...are they real Siamese Tigers? Because from

> what I gather... it is illegal to export Siamese Tigers from

> Thailand...

This may be an important issue since the Indonesian ones

apparently prefer some salt in their water. There is some

good info at:

http://www.wetwebmedia.com/BrackishSubW ... igrfsh.htm

It's not uncommon for animals to be sold as coming from one

country but actually being sourced from another. It's one way

to hide smuggling for instance. It's well known in US herp circles

that a lot of Australian animals (banned from export) are sold

as their Indonesian (actually usually New Guinea) cousins...

Andrew.

[Rob]

I don't know for sure how to ID C.microlepis from C.quadrifasciatus (as I've never had the two side by side). But FWIW here is the info the Baensch Atlas (vol 1) has about the differences

"[C.microlepis] differs from C.quadrifasciatus in several ways: they lack a black patch on the gill; the first body stripe reaches to the throat; the third body stripe, excluding an angled band which crosses the eye, ends at the center of the anal fin. In contrast C.quadrifasciatus has an eye patch, the first body stripe does no reach to the throat and the third body stripe ends before the anal fin."

Looking at the pictures in the book and the ones on the website Andrew posted, it looks to my eye that the most obvious thing is that third body stripe either ending before or in the anal fin (it also seems that C.quadrifasciatus just looks more stripey - but then perhaps I've been staring at the screen for too long ).

Richard, you mention that you think it's illegal for the Siamese tigers to be exported from Thailand - they are also listed as being found in Cambodia, Borneo and Sumatra - maybe they're not coming from Thailand? :roll:

[Richard]

true...i think they are all from borneo / sumatra..... but I must say the one I got was really a steal... more than half the price of what the other shops were selling them for

[macka]

recently they changed the classification of this fish and is now coius mircolepis and the thailand, sumatra, borneo are all the same fish. the confusion was that some where found in brackish and others in fresh water. They swim upstream from the brackish waters to fresh waters to mate. The coius Quadrifasciatus is a muddy silver brown colour with sometimes incomplete strips, where the earlier is white or yellow colour. I take that young guys strips are still forming, and dont be alarmed by the growth as it very slow about 2-3 inches a year. They also shake disease of quite easliy, if it shows signs of sickness just check your ph make sure its 7.2 then do a water change and it will come right.