The reason for the death of thousands of fish in the month of February in Jammu’s famous tourist spot Mansar Lake has been said to be due to lack of oxygen.
The Udhampur district administration came into action after the sudden death fish after which the Fisheries Department was requested to investigate. Fisheries Department Udhampur conducted a detailed investigation after requesting Sher-e-Kashmir University of Agricultural Sciences, Jammu. Experts of the Fisheries Department of SKUAST Jammu collected samples of water and dead fishes of Mansar Lake from the spot, after which their post-mortem examination was done and it was found that the main reason for the death of the dead fishes was lack of oxygen.
According to the report of the experts of the University, there are many reasons for the lack of oxygen in which the wheat flour is often fed to the fishes, the fishes eat the wheat flour and their waste and uneaten flour become the main cause of ammonia. Fishes also increase the amount of ammonia, there is a need to clean the branches of trees on the banks of the lake, this also increases the amount of ammonia. If ammonia levels become high enough, the fish become lethargic and eventually enter a coma and often die, the report said.
This happened in the year 2022 also when the number of fish deaths was not so high. The experts have suggested that more and more fountains should be installed in the lake, which will increase the amount of oxygen in the lake. Along with this, they have also stressed that the amount of fish in the lake should be very high. It has been decided that they should be shifted to some other place, because it is the center of faith here and all the fish in the Mansar Lake are considered as divine by the people.
In this connection, an awareness program was organized by the Wildlife Department on Monday on the banks of Mansar Lake. The program was attended by a large number of local people along with Chief Executive Officer SMDA, Devinder Singh Katoch, Range Officer Wildlife Range Surinsar-Mansar-Jasrota Sanjeev Kumar Bagiya, Block Officers Dheeraj Rampaul and Yashbir Singh Langeh and other field staff members of Wildlife Department, Fisheries Inspector of the Department former Sarpanch, former Panch priest of Sheshnag Temple Mansar, Vivekanand Sharma and other distinguished citizens were also present. During the program, everyone was made aware that there will be a ban on feeding wheat flour to the fishes in Mansar Lake.