Saving the Hump-backed Mahseer through Community Participation in Kerala, India

Dencin Rons Thampy

Other project team members: Ajisha Saidu Pillai and Maxwell Sandeep Aloshyas 

The hump-backed mahseer (Tor remadevii), one of the largest freshwater fish in the world, is often considered functionally extinct with a highly fragmented distribution within the Kaveri River Basin of South India. Once common and distributed throughout the Kaveri River Basin, the hump-backed mahseer is now limited to few isolated populations, occupying only 10% of its original range. As an apex predator and a long-distance migratory species, this fish can be considered an umbrella species, which plays a major role in conserving the functional integrity of riverine ecosystems. The exact distribution of the species in the catchment is still not studied, and no species-specific conservation actions are currently in place. The Kaveri and its tributaries are facing continuous threats from various anthropogenic stressors, resulting in the extinction of several endemic species. The present project is designed to study the distribution, population status, ecological requirements, and threats to the hump-backed mahseer within the upper catchment of the Kabini River, a tributary of the Kaveri, to develop a community-based long-term conservation plan for the species and its habitats, through which better protection is expected to be assured for several other threatened endemic species sharing the habitat.

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