TOKYO, Japan (Reuters) -- A slimy jellyfish weighing as much as a sumo wrestler has Japan's fishing industry in the grip of its poisonous tentacles.Whoa.
Vast numbers of Echizen kurage, or Nomura's jellyfish, have appeared around Japan's coast since July, clogging and ripping fishing nets and forcing fishermen to spend hours hacking them apart before bringing home their reduced catches.
Representatives of fishing communities around the country gathered in Tokyo on Thursday, hoping to thrash out solutions to a pest that has spread from the Japan Sea to the Pacific coast.
"It's a terrible problem. They're like aliens," Noriyuki Kani of the fisheries federation in Toyama, northwest of Tokyo, told Reuters ahead of the conference.
There are no official figures on the size of the problem, but Kani says the financial losses are obvious.
"If your nets are full of jellyfish, of course there is no space for fish," he said.
Cutting up and disposing of the giants can turn a three-hour fishing trip into a 10-hour marathon, while valuable fish are poisoned or crushed under the weight of the unwanted catch.
And what a catch. One Echizen kurage can be up to 2 meters (6 feet, 7 inches) in diameter and weigh up to 200 kilograms (440 pounds).
Despite their size, the invertebrates aren't toxic enough to cause serious harm to humans, but fishermen often wear goggles and protective clothing to avoid stings when dealing with them."
"When you're in jail, a good friend will be trying to bail you out. A best friend will be in the cell next to you saying, 'Damn, that was fun'." — Groucho Marx
Invasion of the Giant Jellyfish
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Still Driving Traffic
Still one of the most popular posts on the blog.
-
If you want to see how thoughts, ideas and impressions can be manipulated by the media take a few minutes to watch Pallywood .
-
***Third Update- I encourage you to also check out : How Many Blogs Do You Read? A question for those who choose to answer. How did you com...
-
She is pregnant with her 18th child . Yes ladies and gentlemen, the Duggars are back. We first encountered The Duggar Family in the followin...
3 comments:
Do they eat people?
Steg,
I don't believe so.
Donna,
Yep.
Yikes!
But I must admit, some small part of me is vaguely surprised that the Japanese haven't figured out a way to eat them....
Post a Comment