Marine fish species tracking projects in the Philippines underway

Floro Taguinod, GMANews.TV 25 Feb 09;

TUGUEGARAO CITY, Philippines – The regional office of the Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources (BFAR) called on fishermen to return their catch and on consumers to spare fishes tagged for scientific research.

Marine fishes particularly big eye, skipjack, or yellow fin tuna (locally known as tangi or tambakul), have been tagged by BFAR as part of the Tuna Tagging project spearheaded by the Oceanic Fisheries Program (OFP) under the Secretariat of the Pacific Community based in New Caledonia.

OFP said, the tuna tagging project will “provide better information on fishery exploitation rates and population sizes in the Western and Central Pacific. Data gathered will allow the improvement of regional stock assessment for the 3 species."

According to BFAR regional director Jovita Ayson the project, already underway, is funded by the Western and Central Pacific Fisheries Commission.

The project carries a $10 dollar reward for yellow tag, $50 for green tag and $250 for orange tag. The latter two have accompanying devices inserted on the body cavity of the fish (near abdomen). The tag on the other hand is attached on the back of the fish near the second dorsal fin.

Recently, fisherman Rodrigo Dayaca from Camiguin Island in Calayan, was awarded by the fisheries bureau of P900 as reward for surrendering a 76-centimeter, 6.7-kilogram tagged yellowfin tuna caught along the dormant Didicas island-volcano.

The caught tagged tuna came from a similar project being conducted by the National Research Institute of Far Seas Fisheries Research Agency in Japan.

Data from the research agency showed that the fish bearing two yellow tags numbered F1131 & F1132, was released from southern Japan in April last year with initial body length of 41 centimeters.

The OFP urges anybody who takes hold of a tagged tuna to record its fork length (upper jaw to the fork in the tail), and date and place of recapture. The OFP also said that extra care must be observed in handling the inserted devices.

A similar species tracking effort is also being undertaken by the Southeast Asian Fisheries Development Center involving small pelagics particularly alumahan (Japanese mackerel), hasa-hasa (short-bodied mackerel, Indian mackerel), and galunggong (round scad).

Aside from the Philippines, other participating countries are Brunei, Cambodia, Thailand, Indonesia, Malaysia, Vietnam and Myanmar.

There are currently 2,400 pieces of the said fish species which were tagged per country-participant and released at predetermined area. The research agency said that results of this study will serve as reference in coming up with comprehensive plan towards the conservation of the fish species.

This project carries $5 dollar reward per tag recovered and returned. - GMANews.TV