Bony fish · Siluriformes · Siluridae

Ghost Catfish

Kryptopterus vitreolus

Least Concern

The species is abundant and widely distributed; it faces no significant short-term risk. See full glossary

The glass catfish is a small silurid from southern Thailand whose body is so transparent that the backbone and the internal organs, packed into a silvery sac behind the head, can be seen through it. It swims in shoals in midwater, tilted at an angle, which is most unusual for a catfish.

Size

4 cm – 7 cm

Diet

Carnivore

Feeds mainly on other animals.

Social structure

School

Gathers in coordinated schools, typical of fish.

Sighting difficulty

Easy

FreshwaterCarnivore In schools Fish Freshwater

13countries 10parks1same family

Fun facts

GeneralIts body is so transparent that its backbone and internal organs show through.
Its transparency comes from muscle with very little reflective tissue and from the complete absence of pigment and scales, and it works as camouflage in open water where there is nowhere to hide.
The iridescent sheen it gives off in certain light comes from diffraction in the banding of its muscle fibres.
Unlike almost all catfish, it is active by day and lives in the water column rather than on the bottom.
It is transparent because, like all catfish, it has no scales, and in addition its genus has no body pigment; the skin is made of collagen fibrils arranged like plywood, which lets light through.
Until 2013 every glass catfish in the trade was wrongly identified as Kryptopterus bicirrhis; Ng and Kottelat then described this species after eighty years of confusion.
Its transparency has made it a laboratory model for studying circulation, nerve regeneration and pigment movement in vivo.