Distribution
Endemic to the isolated mountain lake of Inlé and associated watershed in Shan State, eastern Myanmar.
Type locality is ‘Inlé Lake, Southern Shan States, Myanmar’.
The species is currently listed as ‘Endangered’ on the IUCN Red List due to a significant decline in the wild population. Unsustainable agricultural practices in and around the lake have caused increases in sedimentation, eutrophication, and pollution along with a reduction in surface area of more than 30% between the years 1935-2000. Non-native, predatory Parambassis and Tilapia species have been introduced for farming, while collection for the aquarium trade may also be exerting a negative effect.
Habitat
Lake Inlé lies in a karstic valley almost 900m above sea level in the Shan Plateau region and is home to many endemic animals including nine species of fish and numerous gastropods. The water is clear, shallow (2-3 metres deep in most places) and has a very fertile, loamy substrate, although it can be muddy and turbid around the margins.
It is famed for its stilted villages and local fishermen known as Intha who row their boats using only one leg. These people, thought to have migrated from the south of Myanmar in the late 1300s, use naturally-occurring floating ‘islands’ consisting of tangles of various plant species as gardens.
These islands form a wide raft around the lake margins, rising and falling with the water level, and have come to form the habitats of many fishes which take shelter among the tangle of roots and plant stems at their base. Macrophytes also grow densely in places.
S. resplendens occurs throughout the lake, in both clear and turbid water, but is mostly collected around the vegetated margins.
Maximum Standard Length
25 – 35 mm
Water Conditions
Temperature: 18 – 22 °C
pH: 6.0 – 8.0
Hardness: 54 – 268 ppm
