Electrofishing as a potential threat to freshwater cetaceans

Abstract

Electrofishing is an accepted practice for legal fish sampling and surveying, but its use for subsistence food and market fishing has long been illegal in most countries. Illegal use affects freshwater fish populations in many parts of the world, and has been cited as a cause of mortality for endangered freshwater cetaceans in China (Yangtze dolphins and finless porpoises) and Southeast Asia (Ayeyarwady, Mekong, and Mahakam dolphins in Myanmar, Cambodia, and Indo nesia, respectively), although the extent of this threat to cetaceans is unclear. Given their threatened status, these populations can ill afford such mortality in addition to the other threats they face (e.g. entanglement in gillne..