Fishing

What is Fishing?

Fishing is a common human activity which pertains on getting fish from certain bodies of water. Fishing can be done either on aquatic or marine bodies of water like the ocean/sea, rivers, lakes, and a lot more.Fishes can be caught in the wild or either in the domestic fisheries. There a lot of techniques on how to catch fishes successfully and these are like the trapping, angling, and netting, spearing, and as well as hand gathering.

What are the basic gears for fishing?

(Fishing reels)

  (Fishing rod)

(Sinker and hook)

(Fishing bait)

(Fishing line)

Video on HOW TO SETUP FISHING ROD.....                                                       

Examples of fish :

                                         (arapaima largest fresh water fish)

                                                        (Tuna)    

                                                 (Sailfish)                                                    

                                                 (Catfish)

Why Catch and Release?
With the cost of a typical fishing trip, the uncertainties of success, and the appeal of a fish dinner, why should anglers want to adopt the practice of catch and release? Aside from certain regulations, such as bag limits or size limits, there are a number of good reasons for releasing a portion of the catch alive.
First, catch and release offers a sensible way to extend the fishing trip after a reasonable or legal catch limit has been reached. If the trip involves a guide or charter service, catch and release can prolong an enjoyable recreational opportunity, giving anglers more value for their money.
Second, several recent studies have suggested that as anglers gain expertise in a particular fishery or fishing technique, they often develop an interest in "limiting their kill instead of killing their limit."

Why Do Hooked Fish Die?
Fish that are caught and released may die for several reasons, but the two primary causes are stress and wounding. Stress results from the fish fighting after being hooked. Internally, the physical exertion causes an oxygen deficit in the tissues, forcing the muscles to function anaerobically (without oxygen). This causes lactic acid to build up in the muscle tissue, and then to diffuse into the blood. Lactic acid acts as an acid in the blood, causing the pH of the blood to drop. Even slight changes in pH can cause major disruptions of the metabolic processes, ultimately killing the fish. If the fish is quickly released, its blood pH usually returns to normal and the fish will be unaffected. Some fish, after a long tow, may appear to live once released, but the imbalance in the blood chemistry may kill them as late as three days after being caught. In most cases, the means of preventing this type of mortality is to not keep the fish in action for a long period of time, unless the intent is to keep it.
The other primary cause of mortality is wounding by the hook. Injuries caused by hooks can range from very minor to lethal. The degree of injury is dependent on the location of the hook wound. Higher mortalities will occur in fish that are hooked in the gill or stomach areas, while lower mortalities occur in fish that are hooked in the lip, jaw, or cheek areas. Baited hooks are more likely to result in a gill or stomach hooking that artificial lures. Treble hooks, for obvious reasons, will result in more puncture wounds and subsequently higher mortalities. Barbless hooks facilitate release and decrease "out-of-water" time, but for reasons yet unclear, may not significantly reduce mortality, especially when used with bait.

There are other kinds of physiological stress that can lead to higher mortalities in released fish. Fish may not be able to adjust to changes in pressure or to higher surface water temperatures. Also, when a fish is handled or comes in contact with dry surfaces, such as landing nets or dry hands, its mucous layers – commonly called slime layers – may be partially removed, presenting an opportunity for bacteria or pathogens to invade the skin.

Rainforest

What is rainforest?
Rainforests are the Earth's oldest living ecosystems. 
They are so amazing and beautiful.

These incredible places cover only 6 %of the Earth's surface but yet they contain MORE THAN 1/2 of the world's plant and animal species! 

A Rainforest can be described as a tall, dense jungle.  The reason it is called a "rain" forest is because of the high amount of rainfall it gets per year.  The climate of a rain forest is very hot and humid so the animals and plants that exist there must learn to adapt to this climate.

As many as 30 million species of plants and animals live in tropical rainforests. 

(Right:rafflesia a type of flower only can be found in rainforrest)

Beauty of rainforest

Why are rainforest important?

THEY PROVIDE A HABITAT FOR PLANTS AND ANIMALS

Tropical rainforests took between 60 and 100 million years to evolve and are believed to be the oldest and most complex land-based ecosystem on earth, containing over 30 million species of plants and animals. That's half of the Earth's wildlife and at least two-thirds of its plant species!

Because most tropical rainforest grows in warm and steamy environments, it contains a huge variety of plants. One hectare of lowland rainforest may contain 1000 trees with up to 300 species. Compare this to the UK's forests which are likely to have only 5-10 species per hectare: that's 30 to 60 times more species in a hectare of rainforest! These plants in turn provide food and shelter for many rare animals that depend on the rainforest for their survival. There are many more thousands of rainforest plants and animals species still waiting to be discovered.

THEY REGULATE OUR CLIMATE

Rainforests store water like a huge sponge. In fact, it is believed that the Amazonian forests alone store over half of the Earth's rainwater! Rainforest trees draw water from the forest floor and release it back in to the atmosphere in the form of swirling mists and clouds.

Without rainforests continually recycling huge quantities of water, feeding the rivers, lakes and irrigation systems, droughts would become more common, potentially leading to widespread famine and disease.

Did you know that we also depend on trees to cleanse our atmosphere? They absorb the carbon dioxide that we exhale, and provide the oxygen we need to breathe. When rainforest trees are burnt they release carbon dioxide, which pollutes the atmosphere and contributes to global warming. Deforestation is in fact considered the second major driver of climate change (more than the entire global transport sector), responsible for 18-25% of global annual carbon dioxide emissions.

THEY HELP TO PREVENT SOIL EROSION

Surprisingly, soil in the rainforest is very poor in nutrients. This is because the nutrients are stored in the vast numbers of trees and plants rather than in the soil. Tree roots bind the soil together, while the canopy protects the soil from heavy rains. When a tree dies and its trunk falls to the forest floor, it decays and the nutrients it contains are recycled. However, if trees are removed from the forest, the nutrients are removed with it, along with the protection provided by the tree roots and the forest canopy. The unprotected soil is then simply washed away in heavy rains, causing blockages and floods in lowland rivers, while leaving upland rivers dry.

THEY PROVIDE A HOME FOR INDIGENOUS PEOPLE

Many indigenous people have been living in harmony with the rainforest for thousands of years, depending on it for their food, shelter and medicines. When oil and logging companies come to remove vast areas of forest, they bring diseases which the indigenous people have no resistance to, threatening their survival. Often they are also forced to move away from their homes to unfamiliar places, sometimes even being killed in the process.

RAINFOREST PHARMACY

It may surprise you to know that more than 25% of our modern medicines originate from tropical forest plants. Even so, we have only learned how to use 1% of these amazing plants, so imagine the possibilities if we could experiment with the other 99%!

For example, the rosy periwinkle, found in Madagascar, is used to cure leukemia, while the anti-malarial drug quinine is taken from the bark of the Andean cinchona tree. The rauvolfa shrub found in Asian and African forests is used to cure high blood pressure and mental illness. Rainforests and the native populations who discovered these medicines could hold the cure to many more diseases if we would only nurture the forests and allow their people to show us.

OTHER IMPORTANT FOREST PRODUCTS

  Many foods we consume today such as nuts, bananas, coffee and spices, and industrial products such as rubber, resins and fibres, were originally found in tropical rainforests.