Its gill openings include an unusual spout-like structure found immediately below the base of the pectoral fin.
The head is silver-brown and a black-brown stripe runs from the snout, through the eye and to the first gill opening. The gill area is marked with a black-brown vertical stripe followed by a similar white one.
Elopiformes: Pelvic fins abdominal; body slender, usually compressed; gill openings wide; caudal fin deeply forked; caudal fin with seven hypurals; scales cycloid; mesocoracoid and postcleithra present; gular plate well developed (median); ...
Puntius stoliczkanus is (describe base color) with a vertically elongated black blotch behind the gill opening, and a vertically elongated black blotch on the caudal peduncle.
The gill openings are not hard opercula as on more familiar fish, but smaller, softer skin openings near the pectoral fins.
After 2 to 3 months the young transform (called metamorphosis) into the adult form, loosing the external gills for gill openings.
 See also: Fish, Gill, Water, Species, Aquarium
  
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