Is Southern Africa running out of fish?

jarmoluk pixabay

When it comes to fishing, never did one word say so much. Look up agriculture on Wikipedia and it's "the cultivation and breeding" of plants.

And hunting is about "killing or trapping animals".

But go to fishing and it's "the activity of trying to catch fish".

Now some of the country's top scientists have warned we may be "trying" too hard. Rod and reel, they say, have put some marine life on the same IUCN list as rhinos.

Along with the protea and springbok, South Africa has a national fish, and the galjoen (Dichistius capensis) was a table favourite until banned from sale because of falling numbers.

Colin Attwood and Paul Cowley - both professors of biology - reported on the tag-and-release of 25,000 galjoen and found they stayed mostly in a "home area".

"The danger is they can easily be fished out," says Professor Attwood. "Unlike hake that moves about or marlin that can migrate all the way to Kenya, galjoen spend most of their lives...

Read the full story on the Daily Maverick website.