"VC 10" faces extinction in Volta Lake

A type of fish variously called Blolo, Kpotue or VC 10 which is local to the Volta Lake risks extinction between five to ten years, unless the destructive bamboo method used in trapping them especially during their breeding time is curtailed.

Mr Kofi Agbogah, Research Scientist at the Water Resources Research Institute (WRI), of the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR), made the prediction at a symposium to mark World Environment Day organised by the Ghana Earth Organisation (GEO) for its student members in the Volta Region at Vakpo on Saturday.

He said unlike "Tilapia," "Bolo does not, mature fast" and required a minimum of five years to reach maturity when it would be ready to reproduce.

"Thus its breeding cycle is disrupted when caught at a time when it begins to lay eggs usually in dark nests which they find in the bamboo traps which are submerged in their breeding grounds."

Mr Agbogah said the very tiny mesh nets used in harvesting the "one-mouth-thousand" tiny fishes also haul in a large amount of small "Blolo" species which make up about 50 percent of the amount of the "one-mouth-thousand" caught.

Mr Agbogah urged district assemblies and chiefs along the Volta Lake to act quickly to ensure that the destructive methods for fishing in the lake were curtailed.