More than 1,000 'fish hunters' fight back against invaders wreaking havoc on local rivers: 'It's better to take action than to just leave it alone'
The group was started by Mohamad Haziq A Rahman in 2022. He and other anglers started meeting almost every week to cast their nets into the local rivers and pull up pound after pound of invasive, unwanted fish.
Invasive species are not native to an area. They're usually bought in by humans — in this case, likely by aquarium owners, since suckermouths are popular aquarium cleaners — and from there, they start to take over. Without natural predators and competitors, they multiply rapidly. They can prey on other species — for example, suckermouths eat the eggs and destroy the nesting areas of other fish — and can also damage the habitat, such as when suckermouths burrow into riverbanks and cause erosion.
All of that damage is bad for the environment, but it's also bad for people. The communities living along Malaysia's rivers no longer have access to the traditional native fish and other aquatic species from the region, as catfish are crowding them out, and the riverbank erosion affects the geography of the whole area.
That's why Haziq and his companions catch as many catfish as they can, hauling up nets full of the unwanted fish and returning repeatedly to any area where they're especially plentiful.
"Yes, this fish won't be completely gone from our rivers," Haziq told Al Jazeera. "But if we don't act now, it would be worse. It's better to take action than to just leave it alone. At least we can reduce the population, than allow it to completely take over our local fish."
The catfish they catch from many of the local rivers isn't safe to eat due to pollution — and it's not a first-choice food even when it's safe. While the fish hunters do occasionally eat their catch, they mainly bury it away from the river. Lately, they've been getting more creative, handing the fish over to entrepreneurs who want to turn it into products like charcoal, leather, collagen, or fertilizer.
Around the world, other communities are also working to cull invasive fish from their waters. Some locations have competitions, and others are playing up the promise of free food.
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