At Least 10% Of Native Freshwater Fish Species In Bangladesh Already Extinct - 100 More At Risk

[hatrack]

CHAR PALIAMARY, Bangladesh — Bangladesh's rivers have provided for fisherman Rafiqul Islam's family for generations but a few years ago the 27-year-old noticed his nets were coming up empty. This year, Islam was forced to leave his small fishing community in northern Mymensingh district to find work, an early victim of what scientists are warning is an alarming decline in freshwater fish stocks.

"Eight, ten years ago it was possible for a fisherman to make a decent living all year round -- now, our catches are tiny and most people are having to find other seasonal work to survive," Islam told AFP.

Surveys of fish stocks paint a gloomy picture. According to a report by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) in 2000, Bangladesh is home to 266 species of freshwater fish, 54 of which are classified as "threatened" in the group's Red List. But a more recent study by the Bangladesh Agricultural University (BAU) stated that at least 25 of the freshwater species of fish are now extinct and over 100 species should be classed as threatened.

"We are losing our freshwater fish at an alarming rate," said Professor Mostafa Ali Reza Hossain of the BAU, whose team has spent a decade travelling the country to track the decline in fish species. The dwindling of freshwater fish has major repercussions for low-lying and deeply impoverished Bangladesh, home to numerous rivers, floodplains, lakes and lowland areas.

EDIT

http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5glDTChHn01CfdJXvGpqxcEM9jn9w?docId=CNG.6d8b3a0996aded6a9bfd06907028733c.71

[midnight]

1. How far is this area from an oil rig?

[WinkyDink]

2. I wonder what corporations-without-borders are polluting the waters.....

[MineralMan]

3. A dense population and lack of regulation of fisheries will also

produce the same effect. I'm not saying the water isn't polluted, but it's easy to fish out freshwater resources by over-fishing, too.

[InvisibleTouch]

4. I was surprised to learn recently that a common aquarium fish...

...the beautiful and charismatic red-tailed shark, is considered extinct in the wild. They were originally from that area of the world (well, Thailand and thereabouts). I've kept and enjoyed these in the past in my community aquaria, so it was a bit of a shock to read. Fortunately there are healthy captive-bred populations, but it seems like someone should be looking at re-introduction.