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Last weekend, I went to Pontianak, a capital city of West Kalimantan Province, Indonesia. Pontianak is Equator City located in Borneo Island, I call Siluk Island.

Equator line across in Pontianak city lead warm temperature along of year. The city has equator monument, built in Dutch colonies era. Beside temperature, as most of land in Borneo, soil in Pontianak built from ‘peat soil’ (like acid soil come from depth humic soil for a longtime). Peat soil is very acid, about 3 in pH value. A new pond just could be use about 2 years after built for pH normalizing. Both temperature and water quality condition supported to development and reproduction (including cultivate and aquaculture) of Siluk fish.

Siluk fish is a local name for Arowana (Scleropagus formosus), a native species from Indonesia, especially in Mahakam and Kapuas Rivers. Recently, there’s a international publication that devided Scleropagus to several species based on DNA marker and colour body. Siluk, especially Super Red, is the most exotic and most expensive of freshwater ornamental fishes and included CITES list (appendix 2). It’s mean that Siluk trading just could be done if fish come from aquaculture and not capture.

Siluk aquaculture has been development since 10 years ago. Nowadays, there are 88 registered private companies, as conserve farmers, conducted Siluk aquaculture in Kapuas river, Pontianak region. Siluk cultured in pond, 50x12x2,5 m3 in size. About 25-30 mature fish (60-70 cm in length) stocked communally. As long as, there’s no sexual dimorphism between male and female. Spawn just occur naturally. So, depend on succees of environmental adaptation, by 2-3 months or untill 1 year, Siluk seed could be harvested. About 100 fish seed per crop could be collected. Super Red seed (about 7 cm in length) has price about USD 250-300.