Nonindigenous Occurrences: One fish (272 mm SL) was taken below Springvale Dam on the Mousam River, near Sanford, York County, Maine, during the summer of 1976 (USGS/BRD-G database). Two specimens were collected from the Saco River prior to 1979 (Courtenay and Hensley 1979a), but these records require verification. One fish (318 mm SL) was taken by an angler (who claimed to have caught a second specimen), at Pomps Pond (Merrimack drainage) in Andover, Essex County, Massachusetts, in August 1990 (Hartel 1992; Cardoza et al. 1993; Hartel et al. 1996). The two reports from Rhode Island likely represent duplication of a single record: one fish (209 mm SL) taken from an unspecified pond (Courtenay, personal communication), and one fish taken by an angler at Johnston Pond in Coventry, Kent County, in 1968 (J. A. Stolgitis, personal communication).
Means of Introduction: All probably aquarium releases.
Status: Reported from Maine, Massachusetts, and Rhode Island.
Impact of Introduction: Unknown.
Remarks: Juveniles are sold in the aquarium trade. In its native habitat, this aggressive predator is destructive to other fishes, killing all kinds and sizes in excess of actual needs (Roberts 1989). There is some confusion surrounding the Massachusetts record: the specimen was originally identified as Ophicephalus marulius (= Channa striata) (Halliwell, personal communication); the same fish was later reidentified as Channa cf. micropeltes, but with an error in the collection year [1991] (Hartel 1992), and finally as Channa sp. in Cardoza et al. (1993). Identification as C. micropeltes has since been verified (Hartel, personal communication).
Voucher specimens: Massachusetts (MCZ 96907); Maine (voucher specimen reported to be in University of Maine collection - UMO); Rhode Island (UMO 343).
http://nas.er.usgs.gov/fishes/accounts/channida/ch_micro.html