Marine catfish resources of India

Menon, N G and Balachandran, K and Zacharia, P U and Raje, S G and Feroz Khan, M (2000) Marine catfish resources of India. In: Marine Fisheries Research and Management. CMFRI; Kochi, Kochi, pp. 579-603.

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Abstract

The marine catfish production showed a continuously declining trend all along the Indian Coast, from 67,666 t (1982) to 37,518 t (1995), while the situation is alarming along the SW and SE coast. This group is one of the most vulnerable resources for irrational harvest during their migratory and breeding phase. With the advent of mass harvesting gear like purse seine and trawlers, there has been a continuous onslaught on this resource during the periods of south bound or north bound migrations parallel to the coast. The damage is further aggravated when their spawning shoals are exploited from the surface often causing large scale destruction of parents and egg / embryos, leading to overfishing affecting the recruitment to the population. The paper gives the possible migratory route, seasons of vulnerability and impact of fishing gear on the resources. It is attempted to corelate the surface drift with the seasonal migrations. Various management practices are proposed to conserve the threatened species and suggested possible lines of exploitation preferably on the non-migratory species from distant waters in the middle shelf.

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