Taxonomy & naming
Roberts and Kottelat described the species in 1994 from the Mekong a few kilometres below the Khone (Lee Pee) falls in Laos. It is placed in Lobotidae, the tripletails, with the other Datnioides tiger perches, and the Catalog of Fishes gives the combination Datnioides undecimradiatus.
Morphology
A tall-bodied, laterally compressed perch. FishBase gives a maximum of 15.5 in SL for males or unsexed fish.
Habitat
The middle and lower Mekong basin. FishBase describes a freshwater, benthopelagic, potamodromous fish, meaning it migrates within fresh water. It lives in the mainstream and large tributaries.
Feeding
FishBase records that it feeds on fishes and shrimps.
Mating
Courtship has not been described for this species.
Breeding
Breeding has not been documented for this species.
In the aquarium
Sold by one partner store. At up to 15.5 in it needs a very large tank, and its diet of fishes and shrimps rules out small tankmates. FishBase gives no temperature, pH or hardness range for the species, and the atlas records none.
Conservation
The IUCN Red List classes Datnioides undecimradiatus as Vulnerable, meaning it faces a high risk of extinction in the wild. No assessment year is recorded in the sources available to the atlas.