The season’s first fish farming at the Vellore’s Fort moat began with the release of 30,000 fishes, mainly Catla and Roya varieties, into the waterbody.
Along with local fishermen, officials of the Tamil Nadu Fisheries Development Corporation (TNFDC), which maintains the fish farm in the moat, started the initiative. Every year, on an average, around 40,000 fishes have to be released into the moat to maintain its total growth. In other words, the moat should retain fish growth of 3-5 lakh round the year. Between May and August is the preferred season for the release due to the relatively colder weather.
Sometimes, the liberation exercise gets delayed due to the lack of adequate quantity of fishes from the farms. In Vellore district, the fort’s moat is the only place where fish farming is done by the department. Fishes are brought from large fish farms in the Mordhana dam in Gudiyatham, near Vellore, every season. “Local fishermen were roped in for fishing from the moat on a shared basis depending on the fish varieties. We have been fishing from the moat for decades,” said K. Siva, president, Vellore and Tiruvannamalai Districts Fishermen Society Federation.
