Celestial Pearl Danio (Danio margaritatus)

[Ron Sower]

How can one be bored with the exciting history of these fish with those great photos?  Let her know that this is one unbored guy....!

[BillT]

I really like the interesting story combined with the great pictures.

Somewhere several years ago I read an article on these guys that was saying there were two genetic strains of them, one with round spots and one with more elongated spots.
You think this is a real thing Dennis?

I was never able to see this clearly in the fish swimming around, but with pictures like this it is easy to see the stop shapes. Some of the fish seem to have a a mix of round and oval.

[BallAquatics]

Somewhere several years ago I read an article on these guys that was saying there were two genetic strains of them, one with round spots and one with more elongated spots.
You think this is a real thing Dennis?

I haven't heard that one, but I did hear about red, orange, and yellow colored fish.  Nothing from a reliable source though.  I just figured there was so much hoopla over these fish, it was just idle speculation.

Since 2007, I've purchased groups of these fish from 7 separate sources and if you throw them all in a tank together you can't tell one group from another.

Dennis

[BallAquatics]

Photo by Glenn Axt

Well, shortly after Kamphol posts about the sad state of the original collection site, our little fish gets it's first scientific name.  It was named Celestichthys margaritatus by taxonomist Tyson Roberts in late February 2007.  The trade name of Celestial Pearl Danio comes from Celestichthys from the Latin and Greek words meaning ?heavenly fish? and margaritatus meaning ?adorned with pearls,? Celestichthys margaritatus translates to ?heavenly fish adorned with pearls.?



In June of 2007 10 officials from the Department of Fisheries and the Myanmar Fishery Federation conducted a survey and found the fish at five locations around Ho Pong. Mr. Tin Win of the Hein Aquarium in Myanmar was one of those in this party. Their report identified populations in streams around Ho Pong; the village of Lwe Paw, 3.5 miles east of Ho Pong; the village of Naung Khone, 3 miles north of Ho Pong; the village of Loi?un, 6 miles from Ho Pong; and Hug?park village, Loi?san sit village, Pong?low village, all about 20 miles south of Ho Pong.

It was from this survey that I received these photos from Mr. Tin Win along with the water sample data.

Original location site

New location site #1

New location site #2

Tin Win reports the water where these fish are found is crystal clear with a pH of 7.3 and the conductivity of 250 micro siemen. The pond bottom is covered with sand. The area is mostly grassland and rice paddies, so the ponds are open to the sun and filled with a rich variety of aquatic plants.

With this new information, it seems that the initial scare of the fish becoming extinct in the wild were somewhat premature. All is well with our new fish again!



When it comes to names for our little fish, it turns out that third times a charm. A paper published in January of 2008 by Kevin Conway, Wei?Jen Chen and Professor Richard Mayden of Saint Louis University, will re assigned the species to the genus Danio. This was on the basis of a colour pattern common to all Danios (with the exception of D.erythromicron), osteological studies and phylogenetic analysis.

An interesting note about these fish is that before they were discovered by the aquarium trade, they were caught and sold as food to local poor people. Tin Win says they get a much bigger return on selling the fish for the aquarium trade compared to what they made when they sold the same fish for food. The fish that sold for over $20.00 each on AquaBid, would net the locals 25 Kyats (approximately .50 cents) for a can of 500 dried fish.

Over the years the prices have droped on these fish, and for about the last 18 months have held steady at around $4.00 per fish as an average price. They are a bit harder to produce in quanity, so they will likely never be a inexpensive as some of the easy to breed Danios.

Well I think that brings us up to date with these fish. If I remember something of interest, I'll be sure to post it here.

Photo by Peter Maguire

Photo by Peter Maguire

Photo by Peter Maguire

[Mugwump]

Thanks again, Dennis...I enjoyed, and looked forward to each addition that you posted. These are truly beautiful little fish.

[b125killer]

Thanks for sharing your story. 

[Ron Sower]

Fantastic, and I really appreciate your presentation here, Dennis!

[BallAquatics]

Thanks folks, I really appreciate all the kind words.  I'm very happy you all enjoyed the tale.  I've been accumulating the information and kept thinking I'd put something together for the CPD web site, but I've just never got a round to it.  I guess I should really be thanking all of you for letting me try it out on you!   

Dennis

[Jo]

Thanks for all that info on these beautiful fish! When will you have some of these for sale?

[BallAquatics]

Thanks for all that info on these beautiful fish! When will you have some of these for sale?

Hey, good to see you back in town stranger.  I just asked Jon the other day if we should start to worry about you.   

I've not gotten much done in the fish room here of late so it's looking like next spring before I have any CPD's available.  They really prefer cooler water and stop spawning for me in the summer when the tank temps get into the high 70's low 80's.

Dennis

[Jo]

Thank you for your concern! I just had some health problems with my little girl dog. I posted in lounge.

Please let me know when you are ready to sell some I think these are just stunning. I bought some harlequins a few weeks ago and they are small in size also. I really like the smaller fish in the planted tank. Would love to do a planted tank with just Celestial Pearl Danio's.

I will be reading thru this and looking at amazing pics until then. 

[PaulineMi]

Thanks for sharing the story.  It's very interesting.

Please do keep us posted regarding the availability of these fish.  I had asked you about them a few months ago on the "previous forum". 

[BallAquatics]

Hi Pauline, I'm glad you enjoyed the story.  I haven't forgotten about you wanting some CPD's, it's just that I wasn't completely happy with the ones I raised over the summer, so I didn't sell any of them.  It was just too hot around here!!!  With a little luck, I should have some available when the weather breaks for shipping next spring, probably sometime early in March.

Dennis

[Mir]

Aww, I hadn't seen this until now! I also enjoyed the story and those stunning pics! These are great fish.... and those little baby fries are sooo cute!

[BallAquatics]

Thanks Miranda, they really are great little fish.  There are many really nice Danios that I think most hobbyist are simply unaware of.  As I get my info pulled together, I'll try to go into some detail on some of the others.

Dennis