With a view to determining the quality of fish “seed” from different collection centers in the River Irrawaddy and its tributaries, the expert visited centers in both lower and upper Burma.
The Directorate of Fisheries, Burma, has made extensive surveys in the River Irrawaddy and its tributaries and in the River Sittang and has established the following spawn collection centers.
| Center | River | |
| (i) | Kyawkmyang | Irrawaddy |
| (ii) | Sagaing | " |
| (iii) | Mandalay | " |
| (iv) | Ava | Myintge |
| (v) | Shwedaung | Irrawaddy |
| (vi) | Tharrawaw | " |
| (vii) | Henzada | " |
| (viii) | Yandoon | Pan-Hlaing |
| (ix) | Pantanaw | Irrawaddy |
| (x) | Shwegyin | Sittang |
Since the spawn collection from these centers had been completed long before the arrival of the expert in Burma, he could not view the actual operations. Reports from field officers of the Directorate of Fisheries indicated that the quality of spawn in most of these centers is not very good. It was reported that a better percentage of economically valuable species is obtained at Yandoon and Tharrawaw centers than at the Mandalay and Sagaing centers situated in the upper reaches of the River Irrawaddy. The collection from the Myintge River has been consistently very poor. Shwegyin, a recently established collection center in the River Sittang gave quite a good collection of spawn but the quality was very poor. Examination by the expert of some sollections of fry reared in the nurseries at Hlawga Fish Farm confirmed the above findings.
Fry and fingerling collection centers at Kyawkmyang, Mandalay, Ava, Shwedaung and Yandoon were visited by the expert to study the species composition of the advanced fry and fingerlings of carps collected there. The percentage of major carps in general was not very high, and it was felt that the centers located in the upper reaches of the River Irrawaddy had a greater percentage of minor carps and other uneconomic species than those situated in lower Burma. The minor carp species, namely Labeo bata, L. boga and L. pangusia formed the bulk of the catches in the former centers. At the Myintge River center the catch consisted mainly of Labeo bata and a few L. calbasu.
From these observations and also from the experience of the field staff of the Directorate of Fisheries, Burma, it can be concluded that the spawn available in the rivers of Burma so far surveyed do not contain a very high percentage of economically useful varieties of carps. The same was also confirmed by observations made on the juveniles of carps brought to the markets for sale.
An intimate knowledge of the field identification characters of fry and fingerlings of major and minor carps is essential for a fish culture field worker in Burma. He should be able to identify them correctly for proper stocking as well as for distributing quality fish seed to the public. The expert gave practical training in methods of identification of fry and fingerlings of various major and minor carp species in the riverine collections.
