Fishermen hunt invasive catfish in Malaysia

(11 Jun 2024)
MALAYSIA INVASIVE CATFISH

SOURCE : ASSOCIATED PRESS

SUMMARY RESTRICTION :

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LENGTH: 6:03

ASSOCIATED PRESS
Langat River, Selangor, Malaysia – Sunday 09th June 2024

1. Captured “Bandaraya fish” catfish moving on ground
2. Various hundreds of captured catfish out of water, still moving
3. Bandaraya fish Hunter Group photo op with captured fish
4. Various Nurbakri Mat Sidek pilling up captured fish
5. SOUNDBITE (Malay) Nurbakri Mat Sidek, President Bandaraya Fish Hunters
“Actually these activities are not enough to eradicate them (catfish), we need more people to unite, not just here in Selangor but other states as well like Penang and Kedah, also in Perak we need to join forces.”

6. Various “Bandaraya fish” splashing in the water
7. Volunteer casting nets to catch the “Bandaraya fish”
8. Volunteers clearing fishnets
9. Volunteer holding “Bandaraya fish”
10. SOUNDBITE (Malay) Nurbakri Mat Sidek, President Bandaraya Fish Hunters
“Our rivers are suppose to be full of local fish like Barb-fish or crayfish, but as we can see it's like a foreign river, too many “Bandaraya fish”. It's not even tasty, not many people can eat that (Bandaraya fish).”

11. Volunteers briefing before going out hunting
12. T-shirt (Malay) “Bandaraya fish Hunter”
13. SOUNDBITE (Malay) Nurbakri Mat Sidek, President Bandaraya Fish Hunters
“If we don’t do these kinds of activities, I think our rivers will be destroyed, what kind of fish would we get, There will be nothing left, local catfish, crayfish could go extinct. Even tilapia, we didn’t get much today, on average we get 95 percent “bandaraya fish” today.”

14. Various volunteers casting nets in river
15. Volunteer in the river with nets
16. Syahdani Danial holding captured “Bandaraya fish”
17. SOUNDBITE (Malay) Syahdani Danial, Volunteer
“Please to all those people (aquarium hobbyists) please don’t dump your fish in the river, if possible exterminate (them) because these fish (invasive species) have no value for us, they will destroy our freshwater ecosystem.”

18. Riverbank
19. Local sport-fisherman
20. Various Abdul Razak Qadar fishing
21. SOUNDBITE (Malay) Abdul Razak Qadar, Local Sport Fisherman
“Bandaraya Fish are useless, when we get them we kill then dispose, we just throw them away, because if we release it again it will multiply, so yeah if we catch them we kill and dispose.”

22. Haslawati Baharuddin walking
23. SOUNDBITE (Malay) Haslawati Baharuddin, Research Officer Department of Fisheries Malaysia
“This “Bandaraya fish” or what I like to call Peco with the scientific name of Pterygoplichtys. In Malaysia we can see that it has pillaged our rivers and ecosystem, they have 3 subspecies all from the amazon in south America, they arrive as decorative fish (for hobby aquariums), and are bred worldwide for aquariums, however after that it gets released in the open freshwater rivers and it dominates due to its adaptation to hostile environments.”

24. Various Haslawati and staff taking measurements of captured “Bandaraya fish”
25. SOUNDBITE (Malay) Haslawati Baharuddin, Research Officer Department of Fisheries Malaysia
“First of all they compete with the local fish, because of its dominant adaptations, especially competing for food sources, our research in the surrounding rivers show that after cutting up “Bandaraya fish” to examine the stomach contents, we find them eating small clams and smaller local fish.”

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26. Various volunteer butchering “Bandaraya fish”
27. Various dead fish
29. Ground fish meat








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