ARCHIVED - Mar Menor fishing fleet to stay in port until January

The death of tens of thousands means there are not enough fish in the sea for the fishermen to cast their nets

The condition of the Mar Menor following the appearance ten days ago of tens of thousands of dead fish and crustaceans on the shore – or up to a million according to some estimates – is such that the fishermen based at the port of Lo Pagán, at the northern end of the lagoon, have decided that they will not set sail with their nets until at least January, when they will review the situation.

The reason for all activity in the fishing port coming to an end, hopefully temporarily, is that there are simply not enough fish in the Mar Menor at present for it to be viable. Normally during October the “lonja” fish market would be a hive of activity as catches of sole, sea bass, prawns and other fish are brought ashore and sold, and this is also the time of year when the fleet awaits the “racha”: this is a phenomenon which involves around half of the annual gilthead bream catch being achieved in just a few days when a waxing moon coincides with the arrival of north-westerly breezes and winds.

These conditions case the fish to suddenly headed en masse for the “golas”, the channels which lead them out of the Mar Menor and into the Mediterranean, where the fishermen, of course, are waiting for them with their nets in perfect condition after months of preparation, but this autumn the the quay in Lo Pagán, rather than seeing long and frenetic fish auctions, will be silent and deserted.

The recent deterioration of the Mar Menor, where the death of so many fish is attributed to an episode of anoxia (lack of oxygen) caused partly by floodwater during the gota fría storm in September but also by the runoff of harmful substances from agricultural land over the course of decades, is described by some of the fishermen as “a nightmare” from which they hope to wake up in the near future.

The fishermen have at least been promised compensation by the regional government, but optimism that the fish will have re-populated the lagoon by early next year is not shared by all of them and in the meantime just a handful of boats are venturing out into the Mediterranean while the rest of the fleet is keeping busy with net repairs and maintenance and other tasks.

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