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Has anyone here seen a snakehead? Was just wondering if anybody actually kept these wicked looking fish. Was watching Fishzilla: Snakehead Invasion on the NGC and thought I'd ask. They had some guy on there who had one and told of another that cracked/busted it's 75g tank. I know they're on the nation's most wanted invasive species list and are illegal to tansport, but they'd still be (in my opinion) a sweet fish to have. It would be very interesting to watch their behaviors. They are apex predators, even as juveniles. They showed a video of babies SH's taking out a goldfish. Disturbing.
It also said that they used to be real popular with fish enthusiasts. Their popularity declined after it became illegal to ship in from Asia. Good asian food as well.

Owner of 20g with 7 diamond tetras, 1 mosquito eater,& 1 lyretail molly.

I've seen them in the past. Darn shame, some of them are wicked. Back in the day they were common only one species was easily found at the LFS: the Red Snakehead AKA Cobra Snakehead, Channa micropeltes. C. bleheri and C. gachua were traded over the internet as well; they are dwarf snakehead species and reach less than a foot long, and were therefore bred in captivity. Personally I wanted C. pleurophthalma, as it is a rather attractive fish with the eye-like spots on its sides; its body also appears blue in some images I have seen of it.

www.snakeheads.org has good info on the family of fishes.

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The aquarist is one who must learn the ways of the biologist, the chemist, and the veterinarian.

i've never personally seen them, but there was a news story about this guy who found one devastating the government protected pond behind his convenience store, it started a huge hunt and destroy mission for the game comission

nasty things

are they more related to a coelacanth( lungfish, with limb like appendages) or gouramis, because of the whole breathing air thing?

-a solidary predator, the firetruck stalks its prey

Good question, F1sh!

It appears that anabantoids (gourami, giant gourami, kissing gourami, betta, etc. of the suborder Anabantoidei) are related to channids (snakeheads; if you want to use suborder here they are currently accepted as being in their own suborder, Channoidei). Both of these groups are highly derived ("advanced" in old terminology) within the order Perciformes, and in both groups breathing is achieved through a suprabranchial organ that sits above the gills, rather than a specialized swim bladder that is the primitive equivalent of a lung. Recent papers I am finding find that these two groups form a single group and together are "sister groups"; all this means these groups share a common ancestor. However I haven't found anything that says that the common ancestor had a suprabranchial organ; it may be possible that a suprabranchial organ developed independently in both groups after they diverged. In any case, they are definitely more closely related to gourami, but not necessarily because of the air-breathing.

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The aquarist is one who must learn the ways of the biologist, the chemist, and the veterinarian.

i was just curious, because i know the coelacanth has those extra appendages that they say evolved into limbs on land animals-- but now that i think of it, it would make more sense that it would be more closely related to a gourami

-a solidary predator, the firetruck stalks its prey