Fish fauna of the Kumaon Hills

Table of Contents (ToC)

1. Introduction
2. Localities surveyed
3. Systematic list of species
4. Summary
5. References

Introduction

The Kumaon lakes are of considerable importance for fishing as well as entertainment. Angling is very popular here and provides ,good sport but our knowledge about the fish fauna of Kumaon hills is scanty. Day (1878, 1889) was the first to undertake the scientific survey of the fishes of lndia and published his work in two volumes. Walker (1888) recorded five species from the Nainital lake. Hora (1937 a, b, c ) recorded seventeen species of fishes belonging to different families from Kumaon hills. His collections were mainly from lower waters of Nandhaur and Kalaunia rivers and from Kosi river near Khairna. Menon (1949a,b) gave a list of twentythree species of fishes from the lake and rivulets of Nainital. He also collected fishes from Kosi river (Khairna) and from Almora proper. Menon (1954, 1962) published a long list of fishes from the Himalayas. This is based on a collection from Assam Himalayas , Nepal Himalayas , Punjab Himalayas and Kumaon Himalayas .

As the fish fauna so far described from the Kumaon Himalayas is mainly from Nainital district, it was considered desirable to make an extensive collection from Almora and Pithoragarh districts of this region ( Table 1 ). The fishes were collected during the period 1963-64 and were brought to the Zoological Laboratories of this College for identification. The present paper also includes a brief report on the methods employed by the local people for catching fishes.

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Localities surveyed

The following localities were not easily accessible in the, past due to which an account of the fish fauna of this area is not available. An extension of the transport facilities to these hilly areas helped in the collection of fishes from these places for the first time

River in Almora District	Place of collection	Elevation above sea level (Meters)
1. Sarju	Bageshwar	1579
2. Western Ram Ganga	Chaukhutia	976
	Bhikiasan	1036
3. Kosi	Someshwar	1066
	Hawalbagh	1194
4. Garur Ganga	Garur (Baijnath)	1080
5. Gomati	Bageshwar	1579
	Garur (Baijnath)	1080
6. Lohawati	Lohaghat	1679
7. Gagas	Gagas	975
8. Suyal	Almora	1584

River in Pithoragarh District	Place of collection	Elevation above sea level (Meters)
1. Dhauli	Tawaghat	914
2. Kali	Dharchula	914
	Balua Koat	1066
	Jauljibi	890
3. Gori	Jauljibi	890
4. Eastern Ram Ganga	Thal	1066
	Gangolihat	1584
	Rameshwar Ghat	1036
5. Charma Gar	Askote	1219
6. Small Ponds	at Berinag	1554
	at Barechina	1993
	at Gangolihat	1584

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Systematic list of species

[ ... ]

Channa gachua (Hamilton)

• 1822. Ophiocephalus gachua Hamilton, Fish Ganges, p. 68
• 1959. Channa gachua : Misra, Rec. Indian Mus., 57 (1-4), p. 218.

Local Name . - Shoyn.

Specimens examined . - 11 specimens, from Almora and Pithoragarh districts, 75 mm. to 153 mm. in standard length.

Distribution . - Freshwaters of East Punjab, Western and Eastern Himalayas, Assam, Orissa, Travancore, Madras, Bombay, Poona, West Bengal, Delhi and U.P.. This is the first record from Pithoragarh district.

[ ... ]

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Summary

All extensive collection of fishes was made from Almora and Pithoragarh districts of the Kumaon hills during the year 1963-64. In all twenty-nine species from Almora district and twenty-three from Pithoragarh were collected and identified. The places visited for collection have been indicated. A brief account of the methods employed by the local people for catching fishes has been given.

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References

• DAY, F. 1878 : The Fishes of India. - London, pp. xx+778, 198 pls.
• DAY, F. 1889 :The Fauna of British India including Ceylon and Burma . Fishes, Vol. 1, pp. xviii+548-London (Taylor and Francis).
• HORA S. L. 1937a : Comparison of the Fish-fauna of Northern and Southern faces of the Great Himalayan Range . - Rec. Indian Mus., Calcutta, 39 (3), pp. 241-250.
• HORA, S. L. 1937b : Distribution of Himalayan fishes and its bearing on certain palaeogeographical problems . - Rec. Indian Mus., Calcutta, 39 (3), pp. 251-259.
• HORA, S. L. 1937c : Notes on fishes in the Indian Museum. XXXIII. On a collection of Fish from Kumaon Himalayas . Rec. Indian Mus., Calcutta, 39 (4), pp. 338-341.
• MENON, A. G. K. 1949a : Notes on fishes in the Indian Museum. XLIV. Fishes of Kosi Himalayas, Nepal . - Rec. Indian Mus., Delhi, 47, pp. 231-235.
• MENON, A. G. K. 1949b : Fishes of Kumaon Himalayas . - J. Bombay nat. Hist. Soc., Bombay, 48 (3), pp. 535-542.
• MENON, A. G. K. 1954 : Fish geography of the Himalayas . - Proc. nat. Inst. Sci. India, New Delhi, 20 (4), pp. 467-493
• MENON, A. G. K. 1962 : A Distributional list of fishes of the Himalayas . J. zool. Soc. lndia., Calcutta, 14 (1/2), pp. 23-32.
• WALKER, W. 1888 : Angling in Kumaun lakes . Not consulted in original. [Calcutta, 105 pp - snakeheads.org]

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Acknowledgement and Source(s)

This text was originally published under the above title in: Records of the Indian Museum . Vol. 39, pp. 338 - 348, in the year 1937. The copyright owner Zoological Survey of India has granted snakeheads.org the right to publish it on the org's site. The copyright of text is still with the owner in full amount.