Thousands of rare fish - barbels - have been released into Neris

If you stopped in the lower reaches of the Merkis River in June, you might have noticed the minnows – the bottom ones – on the banks of the river. fish, which every fisherman dreams of catching. Gathered in the spawning grounds in the big rivers of Lithuania, these fish are quite vulnerable, but it seems that nature itself takes care of the offspring of the minnows - the eggs of these fish are poisonous, so it is not advisable to enjoy them.

The population of these interesting fish has declined dramatically in recent times. Here, the specialists of the Fisheries Service under the Ministry of Agriculture come to the aid of nature, stocking the rivers of Lithuania with artificially bred, but no worse, mullet.

This time, 2 thousand rare wrasse were released in Vilnius, in the Neris river. Minister of Agriculture Kęstutis Navickas also took part in the launching of the future river giants, and he was assisted by the pupils of the Vilnius Kindergarten "Liepsnelė", for whom this was the first time they had met the otters.

"We are happy that we can contribute to the enrichment of rivers with these rare fish. What nature cannot do for one reason or another, humans do - with knowledge, resources and determination to achieve a goal, they create a small miracle. The little ones who participated in it especially liked the stocking - I believe that when they grow up and take a fishing rod in their hands, there will be much more mussel in the rivers of Lithuania. We are here to contribute to that," says Minister of Agriculture K. Navickas.

The beginning of the path of small whiskers is in human hands

The moose that were released into the Neris River began their journey in the Fish Breeding Department of the Eastern Region of the Fisheries Service, in a special closed water circulation system. However, the path to successful mustache breeding was not easy.

The spawning time of fish kept in concrete ponds was highly dependent on outdoor temperature conditions, which cannot be controlled, so in the spring, when the temperature suddenly rose, the eggs overmature and became unsuitable for fish breeding.

"Despite this, the specialists of the Department of Fish Resources Restoration did not give up and formed a high-quality herd of bream breeders. In order to acquire the necessary knowledge of mustache breeding and to adopt good practices, the employees of the service went to specialized farms for internships several times. in Poland. in 2019 specialists of the service successfully carried out artificial breeding of mustaches, obtained the first viable larvae of mustaches and successfully began to stock water bodies. We are happy that the efforts and the acquired knowledge have allowed us to achieve the desired results, and from now on, many more of these rare fish will swim in the Nery," says Tomas Kazlauskas, director of the Fisheries Service.

The hatched tentacle larvae were successfully reared in 2019 as well. 4 thousand in October for the first time, small tentacles were released into the Neris River. The average weight of released whiskers is 2 g. This year, 2 thousand have already been released into the Šventoji river (Ukmergė district). mustache yearlings.