![]() Even the large high-speed ferries from Boston canceled their trips to Provincetown. This weather system put a screeching halt to all beach and waterfront commercial offerings, as sea conditions were far too inhospitable for whale watching, fishing, and all other summertime activities on the water. But a very unusual winter-like nor’easter blew through here beginning Saturday and lasted until Monday.Īlthough we did not get much of the rain that the stay-home-and-garden folks needed out of it, we had unrelenting winds of up to 40 miles per hour. During the week, water temperatures crept up to that magical 60-degree mark, which is when things start to percolate at a faster pace. There are credible reports of bluefish already in Cape Cod Bay and a few have been taken along the south shore of the Cape. The whale lunged, feeding, through three enormous schools of pogies. The other day on the Cee-Jay, my passengers had an unexpected treat as we watched a juvenile humpback whale in the harbor at Long Point. There are also mackerel virtually everywhere, but particularly in the west end of our harbor. You can’t miss them: they appear on the surface as huge dark patches accompanied by pitter-patter splashing on the water’s surface. There are massive schools of pogies from the harbor out to Wood End. ![]() Fresh mackerel bait and vertical jigs have been the ticket to success oddly enough, swimming plugs have not produced like they normally do early in the season. But they are here now, and they are hungry and biting. In the past few years, we have not generally seen bass that big here, especially this early in the season. Max Santos, age 11, with his 44-inch striped bass. and his three sons, Myles, Max, and Mason, each got monster bass as well they measured 42, 44, and 45 inches, respectively. Vaughn Cabral on his private boat brought in the biggest striped bass he has ever caught - a 49-inch fish - right in the harbor behind the breakwater. Dave of the Ginny G got into some big bass in deep water just past Long Point off the Twin Hills. In Thailand, Mekong giant catfishes have been successfully bred in artificial ponds, but efforts to introduce these fish in the wild have largely failed.Some very big striped bass have moved into our area with several fish in excess of 40 inches being caught and released. It is now illegal in Thailand, Laos, and Cambodia to harvest the critically endangered species, though giant catfishes still are illicitly caught, with some sold to restaurants in Vietnam. Conservation effortsĬonservationists have focused on the Mekong giant catfish as a flagship species to promote conservation on the river. Overfishing is the primary cause of the giant catfish’s decline, but damming of Mekong tributaries, destruction of spawning and breeding grounds, and siltation (a process by which water becomes dirty with fine mineral particles) have also taken a huge toll. Some experts think there may be only a few hundred, or even fewer, adults left in the Mekong River. With no population figures available, estimates of the decline are based on the fall in the number of fish caught. These giant catfish were once plentiful throughout the Mekong basin, but their numbers are believed to have dropped by at least 95 percent over the past century. While scientists don’t know exactly how the fish move, the Mekong giant catfish is believed to spend much of its time feeding in Cambodia’s Tonle Sap Lake and then migrating hundreds of miles north to spawning grounds in Thailand. Highly migratory, the species requires large stretches of river and very specific environmental conditions for its seasonal journey to spawn and breed. It can reach up to 440 pounds in only six years. The Mekong giant catfish has one of the fastest growth rates of any fish in the world. After about a year, they become herbivores, and eat plants and algae. (Juveniles have barbels, but these features shrink as they age.)Īs babies, they feed on zooplankton in the river and are known to be cannibalistic. They are distinguished from other large catfish species by their near-total lack of barbels, or “whiskers,” as well as by the absence of teeth. Gray to white in color and lacking stripes, the Mekong giant catfish has very low-set eyes, which gives it a slightly sorrowful appearance. According to the Guinness Book of Records, a nine-foot-long individual caught in northern Thailand in 2005 weighted an astounding 646 pounds, making it the largest exclusively freshwater fish ever recorded.ĭespite its gargantuan size, but also because of it, the giant catfish lives a tenuous existence in the murky waters of its native river, Southeast Asia’s Mekong, where its numbers have plummeted so dramatically that the species is on the brink of extinction. ![]() The Mekong giant catfish is the official freshwater heavyweight champion of the world.
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