‘The Old Man and the Sea’, which has an old fisherman Santiago struggling to catch a fish is a story that can never be set in the coast of Kollam. For the old fishermen, who are physically too weak to go out into the sea, are helped by those playful creatures of the sea - dolphins - to catch fish even without moving from where they are.
Dolphins are known to be excellent beach hunters, where one or more dolphins chase a school of fish from deep sea to shallower waters near the beach. Caught between the dolphins and the beach, the cornered fish jump out everywhere.
All that the old fishermen have to do is wait on the beach with a net. At times, they end up with more fish than the younger men who venture out on a boat.
Scientists A Bijukumar, R Smrithy and K Sathasivam of the KU Department of Aquatic Biology and Fisheries have scientifically recorded this dolphin-assisted fishing and published it in the latest issue of the Indian Journal of Fisheries. The paper documents the traditional cast net fishery in the Ashtamudi estuary, taking advantage of the behavioural patterns of the Indo-Pacific humpback dolphin, Sousa chinensis. The dolphins move at great speed, swimming inverted or one side and each chase lasts about a couple of moments.
“The movements of the dolphins and the tidal current correlate with each other, which is in turn connected with the movement of the fish. For the aged fishermen, the presence of dolphin is a good omen, as they cast their nets only during the chasing of fish by the dolphins,’’ said A Bijukumar.
However, it is not just old men who go in for such dolphin-assisted fishing. At a given time you find at least 10 fishermen waiting at various points along the estuary for the dolphins to arrive.
The total number of fishermen at Ashtamudi estuary, who take the help of dolphins, is about 30.
The primary prey of dolphins in Ashtamudi estuary was found to be mullets and this was the most abundant fish caught in the cast net. However, the total catch recorded with the help of dolphins was higher than that recorded without their help.
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