KARACHI: Two dolphins incidentally caught by fishermen recently were released safely back into the sea, the World Wide Fund for Nature-Pakistan (WWF-P) reported on Wednesday.

In the first instance, according to the organisation, a two-metre long pantropical spotted dolphin, named tushuk in Balochi and gokin in Sindhi, got entangled in the gillnet being used by fishermen operating in the Indus Canyon about 176km southeast of Karachi last Tuesday.

Fishermen led by Ameer Badshah, captain of a tuna fishing boat, safely released the dolphin back into the sea.

In the second instance, Ghulam Mustafa, Ghulam Sarwar, Ghulam Murtaza helped by Abdul Qayyum released a 1.5-meter long Indian Ocean humpback dolphin, which was entangled in their gillnet while they fished along Balochistan’s coast on Sunday.

The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) lists the Indian Ocean humpback dolphin as endangered and pantropical spotted dolphin as ‘least concern’.

However, population of the pantropical spotted dolphin in the Southeast Asian region is listed in the Appendix II of the Convention on the Conservation of Migratory Species of Wild Animals.

“Numbers of pantropical spotted dolphin is believed to have declined in Pakistan. They easily get entangled in fishing nets laid in the coastal and offshore waters,” said Mohammad Moazzam Khan, technical adviser on fisheries resources at WWF-P.

Pantropical spotted dolphins, he said, were found in all temperate and tropical oceans and considered to be very active in making large, splashy leaps in the sea.

Elaborating on threats to dolphins, he said that once entangled, most dolphins drowned and died immediately, though in some cases, entangled dolphins did survive onboard fishing vessels, he added.

Sharing some estimates, he said that dolphin mortality in the gillnet fisheries was estimated to be as high as 12,000 annually a few years back.

To address this concern, he pointed out, the WWF-P created awareness among fishing communities and trained fishermen on the use of subsurface gillnet in offshore waters and how to release endangered marine species from fishing nets.

“This has led to a significant decrease in dolphin mortality and we now estimate that only about 30 to 40 dolphins die annually as a result of these operations,” he said, adding that there were about 8,700 gillnet vessels operating in the coastal and offshore waters out of which around 700 fish in offshore waters.

Dr Babar Khan, regional director (Sindh and Balochistan) at WWF-P, said that the organisation had developed an action plan to protect cetaceans in 2013 which was endorsed by all major stakeholders.

“There is a need to adopt and implement this action plan, which will ensure protection of cetaceans including dolphins, porpoises and whales in Pakistan’s waters,” he said.

It might be recalled that dolphins are now protected under Sindh and Balochistan fisheries laws as well as under Balochistan (Wildlife Protection, Preserv­ation, Conservation and Manage­ment) Act, 2014.

Published in Dawn, October 25th, 2018

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