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Net entangled whale shark rescued and released into ocean
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FIsherfolk tried to push the entangled whale shark back into the ocean. Pic by Hiran Priyankara Jayasinghe
By Malaka Rodrigo
With the hope of getting a good catch, a group of fisherfolk gathered at Nawakkadu beach in Puttalam on Monday. They laid a large ma dela (seine fishing net) in the morning and began pulling on the ropes after some time.
The ma dela felt heavier than the other days, and this brought smiles to their faces, but their joy fell short after they discovered a large whale shark that was entangled in the net, making it heavier.
Whale shark meat does not have commercial demand, and it is prohibited to catch these creatures in Sri Lankan waters. The fisherfolk also felt sympathy for the whale shark that was struggling for its life while it was entangled in the ma dela so they tried to push it back into the ocean.
The giant fish was about 38 feet long and might have been more than 4000 kg heavy, so it was not an easy task for the fisherfolk.
As the fisherfolk’s efforts to push the whale shark back into the water failed, field officers at the Puttalam Wildlife Department office sought help from the Sri Lanka Navy. The Puttalam Navy camp sent a team to assist the distressed giant who had been beached for several hours. They secured a rope around the whale shark’s tail and with the assistance of water jets, pulled the creature towards deeper waters.
While the rescue operation took several hours and the whale shark was in distress, Puttalam Wildlfie Department officers said the creature may have survived.
The area was an active fishing ground, which was visited by hundreds of fishing boats every day, but the fact that no whale shark carcass was found was a positive sign, the officers said.
Several incidents much like this one were annually reported in Sri Lanka, said Dr. Sisira Haputantri, Head of the Marine Biological Division at the National Aquatic Resources Research and Development Agency (NARA).
A whale shark could grow up to 40 feet or more and could weigh around 20 tonnes. Whale sharks were around eight metres in length globally, but the gentle giants who swam in Sri Lankan waters were usually around six to seven metres in length, said Dr. Haputantri, adding that Sri Lanka banned catching whale sharks in 2015 as it was an endangered species.
Whale sharks were not uncommon in Sri Lankan territorial waters and stormy conditions in the ocean may push them toward shallow seas, said marine mammals expert Dr. Ranil Nanayakkara. Whale sharks were more common in the Gulf of Mannar and the Northern waters, but they could even be found in the sea close to Colombo, Dr. Nanayakkara said.
Blue whales were said to be the largest marine creatures, but as they were mammals and not fish, whale sharks were said to be the world’s largest fish. Scientifically classified as Rhincodon typus, the whale shark was called ‘mini muthu mora’ in Sinhala.
Whale sharks were actually a species of shark and not whales, but unlike other sharks, they did not have teeth and were filter feeders that fed mainly on plankton. They were gentle creatures that did not pose any danger to humans, and divers even swam with them.
“We do not know much about whale shark movements in our waters, so it is important to have a specific research programme,” said Dr. Nanayakkara, adding that the Maldives conducts a whale shark study programme.
The spots on a whale sharks body were unique to each creature, much like human fingerprints, making it easy for scientists to identify individual creatures. From 2009 to 2022, 647 individual whale sharks were identified in the Maldivian waters under the study programme.
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