Conservationists are celebrating the invention and launch again into nature of six extremely endangered Mekong giant catfish in Cambodia.
The bumper catch within the Mekong River Basin has boosted hopes of a revival of the critically endangered specieswhich is among the many world’s largest freshwater fish.
Fishermen launched the fish alongside officers from Cambodia’s Fisheries Administration (CFA), smiling as they held up the animals — weighing as much as 130 kilograms (287 kilos) every.
What the giant haul means
The USAID-funded Wonders of the Mekong conservation group stated the seize of so many giant catfish over simply 5 days was “a remarkable and unprecedented event.”
“I’ve never heard of this before,” stated analysis biologist and mission lead Zeb Hogan, from the University of Nevada.
Reno.
“It’s a hopeful sign that the species is not in imminent, like in the next few years, risk of extinction, which gives conservation activities time to be implemented and to continue to bend the curve away from decline and toward recovery.”
“By tagging these fish, we gain critical information about their ecology, their migrations, their habitat…to try to help these fish survive in the future,” Hogan stated.
How dangerous is the plight of the giant Mekong catfish?
According to the IUCN Red List, the present inhabitants of the giant Mekong catfish is unknown however it’s thought to have declined by round 80% up to now 13 years.
They at the moment are solely present in some stretches of the Mekong River and its tributaries, however up to now inhabited the size of the 4,900-kilometre (3,044 mile)-long river — from its outlet in Vietnam to its greater reaches within the Chinese province of Yunnan.
The Mekong, a crucial Southeast Asian waterway has lengthy been tormented by unlawful fishing, habitat loss and plastic waste.
In addition, the Mekong River Basin develop into a harder habitat to outlive in due to dams, together with so-known as mega-dams, and local weather change. These have had a devastating affect on water ranges and upstream connectivity within the dangerously rare catfish’s aquatic habitat.
