Thailand lends a helping hand to the endangered bamboo shark

Fisheries researchers are diving to the ocean floor in the Gulf of Thailand where they release bamboo sharks from baskets full of this type of fish.
And in the past few years, the tiny, extra-long-tailed striped shark, which is known for its slow movement due to its popularity among fish farmers and exotic food lovers, has been threatened with extinction.

Researchers have released dozens of baby bamboo sharks into the bay over the past several months in the hope of removing them from the International Union for Conservation of Nature’s list of “Near Endangered” species.

“We dive to the bottom of the sea to release the fish in a safe area so that they have a better chance of surviving, rather than releasing them at the surface like most other animals,” Odom Kroniam, a fisheries official, told Reuters from a diving boat earlier this month. According to “Reuters”.

Last week, researchers released 40 brown bamboo sharks, aged between two to three months, into a purpose-built artificial reef at a depth of 18 metres.

The Gulf of Thailand is the original home of this type of fish, and it can also be found in Southeast Asia, Japan and northern Australia.

These sharks are one of the smallest marine predators and grow to a maximum length of 1.2 meters and do not threaten humans, feeding primarily at night using their small teeth to catch and devour prey.

The researchers hope that these fish will settle in their new habitat, where they will initially live in artificial reefs in the hope of breeding.

This project has so far helped feed and release more than 200 bamboo sharks in the Gulf of Thailand.