Rangamati Correspondent :
Fish culture in the Kaptai Lake as well as in other water bodies of the hill districts has good prospects. Of those, creeks (locally known as ghonas) can play a vital role in increasing the fish production at the lake.
There are many creeks which are the arms of the lake. Three sides of the arms of a creek are surrounded by hilly land while the rest remain directly or indirectly linked with the main body of the lake.
There are total 4,727 creeks covering 4,297 hectare areas of Chittagong Hill Tracts (CHT), and of those, 1,200 are adjacent to the Kaptai Lake. The fish production capacity at these creeks is 2,100 kg per hectare, while at Kaptai Lake, it is only 131 kg per ha, which is eight to nine times more than the Kaptai Lake’s.
Meanwhile, the current fish production at the Kaptai Lake is going downwards, and requires serious management effort through creek aquaculture in order to fully utilise the lake’s fishery potential.
The Department of Fisheries is trying to modernise the creek aquaculture activities in CHT and has undertaken programmes for improving the existing creeks while some steps have been taken to create new creeks for fish culture.
A five-year long project of the government to increase the creek-based fish cultivation at CHT areas at a cost of Tk 68 crore is being implemented, but the project has failed to achieve the target due to some technical and management faults, complained some beneficiaries of the creek-based fish cultivation.
Meanwhile, Bangladesh Fisheries Research Institute (BFRI) is trying to implement the creek-based fish culture technique and carrying out different research projects to improve fish production at the creeks. But, the scarcity of quality fish fingerlings in the hilly areas is a great disadvantage for fish culture. There is a government hatchery at Kawkhali upazila of Rangamati district which is the only source of the fingerlings. Senior Scientific Officer of BFRI’s Riverine Substation in Rangamati M A Bashar told The Daily Observer that the fish cultivators collect most of the fingerlings from outside the district at a high cost, and the quality of the fingerlings is also not good.
As a result, the cultivators are not getting expected output, he added.
In this connection, the BFRI has developed a method for rearing carp fry in the Kaptai Lake creeks. As per the method, five-day old Indian Major Carp fries are stocked and reared to achieve the size of fingerling in 60 days.
Findings from these studies might have important implications for enhancing fish production and in designing economically viable IMC fry production in the Kaptai Lake.
Fish culture in the Kaptai Lake as well as in other water bodies of the hill districts has good prospects. Of those, creeks (locally known as ghonas) can play a vital role in increasing the fish production at the lake.
There are many creeks which are the arms of the lake. Three sides of the arms of a creek are surrounded by hilly land while the rest remain directly or indirectly linked with the main body of the lake.
There are total 4,727 creeks covering 4,297 hectare areas of Chittagong Hill Tracts (CHT), and of those, 1,200 are adjacent to the Kaptai Lake. The fish production capacity at these creeks is 2,100 kg per hectare, while at Kaptai Lake, it is only 131 kg per ha, which is eight to nine times more than the Kaptai Lake’s.
Meanwhile, the current fish production at the Kaptai Lake is going downwards, and requires serious management effort through creek aquaculture in order to fully utilise the lake’s fishery potential.
The Department of Fisheries is trying to modernise the creek aquaculture activities in CHT and has undertaken programmes for improving the existing creeks while some steps have been taken to create new creeks for fish culture.
A five-year long project of the government to increase the creek-based fish cultivation at CHT areas at a cost of Tk 68 crore is being implemented, but the project has failed to achieve the target due to some technical and management faults, complained some beneficiaries of the creek-based fish cultivation.
Meanwhile, Bangladesh Fisheries Research Institute (BFRI) is trying to implement the creek-based fish culture technique and carrying out different research projects to improve fish production at the creeks. But, the scarcity of quality fish fingerlings in the hilly areas is a great disadvantage for fish culture. There is a government hatchery at Kawkhali upazila of Rangamati district which is the only source of the fingerlings. Senior Scientific Officer of BFRI’s Riverine Substation in Rangamati M A Bashar told The Daily Observer that the fish cultivators collect most of the fingerlings from outside the district at a high cost, and the quality of the fingerlings is also not good.
As a result, the cultivators are not getting expected output, he added.
In this connection, the BFRI has developed a method for rearing carp fry in the Kaptai Lake creeks. As per the method, five-day old Indian Major Carp fries are stocked and reared to achieve the size of fingerling in 60 days.
Findings from these studies might have important implications for enhancing fish production and in designing economically viable IMC fry production in the Kaptai Lake.
