Tuesday, Aug 20, 2013
Dubai: Open water sources across the emirate are being populated by Dubai Municipality with a small native fish in a new eco-friendly project to control mosquitos.
The municipality has just released the third generation of the aphanius fish bred in captivity by the municipality Pest Control Section especially for the mosquito-control programme.
Aphanius, also known as Arabian Killfish, rarely grow above five centimetres long and were chosen because they eat mosquito larvae growing in ponds, irrigation channels, and outdoor open tanks.
The thrust of the programme is that it is completely natural to the environment and because the fish are already native to the region, there is no risk of introducing an invader species to the watershed.
Dr Al Mahy, pest control specialist at the department, told Gulf News yesterday: “This is a local, native fish and it never becomes big.”
The fish, he said, are far better than spraying harmful mosquitoes with pesticides to keep summer populations low.
“There is no pesticide, we are saving the environment and we are not contaminating the water,” said Dr Al Mahy. “Our target is to cover 1,390 irrigation tanks in the farms.”
By Derek Baldwin ?Chief Reporter
Gulf News 2013. All rights reserved.
