Scatophagidae

The scats are a small family, Scatophagidae, of fishes in the order Perciformes.

They are small fish native to the Indian and western Pacific Ocean that have been popular in the aquarium trade in the last 30 years. Although juvenile scats may live in a freshwater environment, most adult scats prefer and do best in a brackish water environment with 3-4 teaspoons of salt per 2.5 gallons of water once they reach adulthood. However, the African Scat, Scatophagus tetracanthus, can and does live in freshwater in the wild and is even known to reproduce in freshwater. The largest species reaches 38 cm in length and some have been known to live more than twenty years in captivity given the proper water conditions. They are scavengers, feeding on algae and feces, hence their name, from Greek skatos meaning "feces" and phagein meaning "eat".

Species

There are four species in two genera.

• Genus Scatophagus Cuvier in Cuvier and Valenciennes, 1831
  • Scatophagus argus – Common Scat, Green Scat, Ruby Scat
  • Scatophagus tetracanthus – African Scat (Lacépède, 1802).
• Genus Selenotoca Myers, 1936
  • Selenotoca multifasciata – Silver Scat (Richardson, 1846).
  • Selenotoca papuensis – Moon Scat Fraser-Brunner, 1938.

References

• Froese, Rainer, and Daniel Pauly, eds. (2006). "Scatophagidae" in FishBase. January 2006 version.
• "Scatophagidae". Integrated Taxonomic Information System. http://www.itis.gov/servlet/SingleRpt/SingleRpt?search_topic=TSN&search_value=170319. Retrieved 27 March 2006.