- Summary
- Objectives
- Status
- Project Publications
Summary
The project focuses on monitoring and studying elasmobranchs (sharks, rays, and skates) at two landing sites in Chennai, Tamil Nadu: Kasimedu (Major fish landing site) and Patinapakkam (small-scale fishing). These two sites have distinct characteristics and practices when it comes to fishing and elasmobranch catches.
Objectives
1. Monitoring incidental shark and ray catches from non-selective fishing gear at a major fishing harbour.
2. Monitoring incidental shark and ray catches from more selective fishing gear at a small-scale fishing site.
3. Assessing the impact of these fisheries, by comparing with targeted fisheries for sharks and rays.
Status
- The landings of elasmobranchs (sharks, rays, and skates) across two contrasting landings sites in Chennai, Tamil Nadu were monitored. Informal interviews with fishermen were also conducted to understand the traditional fishing practices, their fishing location and the different types of nets used.
- Kasimedu, a major fish landing harbour and one of the oldest in Chennai, has ~600 vessels, 250 of which are deep sea vessels. Of the rest, the majority operate bottom trawl gear. Fishing trips at Kasimedu, on average, last 14 days. We identified 27 species of sharks and 32 species of rays here. Various elasmobranch products are exported internationally from the harbou and also transported to different states across India. This is in addition to the demand for local consumption.
- In contrast, fishing at Patinapakkam is small‐scale. Fishermen generally go out on small boats during early morning for about 8–10 hours and use gill‐nets or other manual fishing gear. We recorded only 5 species of sharks and 11 species of rays from this site. It was interesting to note that nets that are specific for catching rays are used here; yet, the catch numbers are less than those reported from Kasimedu.The catch is then sold locally. There is no export of elasmobranch products from this landing site.
- Female sharks were caught in higher numbers than males at both the landing sites. For the top five shark and rays species, those caught from Kasimedu included a mix of adults, juveniles and neonates in higher numbers than those from Pattinapakkam. This points to more intensive and unsustainable fishing practices employed at Kasimedu, which has a direct impact on elasmobranch population numbers.
- An illustrative poster communicating scientific information on elasmobranchs in an accessible format has been developed as tool to aid educational programmes.