Due to the difficulties of Tilapia culture in Africa, particularly, those resulting from overproduction and consequent stunting in growth, attention was focused on another African fish group, which included the large size African catfish, Clarias gariepinus (Burchell, 1882). For pond culture of this species initial attempts were made at the end of sixties and beginning of seventies. The main delimitation of pond culture of it was the inadequate supply of seed at that time (Hogendoorn, 1979).
In the past two decades, methods of fish seed production, intensive and pond rearing of Clarias gariepinus were developed. These studies were made mainly in Central African Republic, the Netherlands and Israel (Viveen et al., 1986). Moreover, necessary taxonomical and biological examination of the African catfish group were carried out in the same period, which revealed that Clarias lazera and Clarias gariepinus so long considered as two separate species, were same and hence they came under the same scientific name Clarias gariepinus (Burchell, 1822) (Janssen, 1987).
Outside its natural habitat the species is cultured in cooling water of power stations in the Netherlands and also in hot springs in Hungary. The species was also introduced in Thailand, and China. At the end of 1989 the African catfish was introduced in Bangladesh from Thailand by the Ministry of Fisheries and Livestock, Government of Bangladesh.
The African catfish (it is known as African magur in Bangladesh) is similar to a few Asian catfish species as Clarias batrachus and Clarias macrocephalus. The main distinguishing feature of the species is the shape of occipital process of skull (Figure 1).
