Saving Sandella Bainsii

Robert Odoul

G21 Staff Writer

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It has sad, bulging, eyes. Its mouth is beefy and protruding rendering the atmosphere around this ashen grey fish funereal. And for good reason. The Eastern Cape Rocky (sandelia bainsii), a unique African freshwater fish species, closely related to the climbing perch of Africa and Asia is threatened with extinction.

An invasion of its main habitats by the South American red water fern and other alien fish and plant species, the constructions of dams, climatic changes and pollution have all contributed to this.

Now a lone South African fish biologist has taken it upon himself to save it from extinction. Dr Jim Cambray, Curator at Albany Museum's department of Ichthyology in Grahamstown, South Africa, says he was stunned when after a 20-year absence, he came back to South Africa find the fish almost extinct.

To save it -- the World Conservation Union's red data book has already ranked it Critically Endangered, which is the last step before extinction -- Cambray is spearheading the Save The Sandelia Bansii Campaign, a world-wide crusade the Albany museum researcher is also using as a red flag to highlight what is happening to the world's freshwater ecosystem.

The campaign pitches the fish's unique behaviour to highlight reasons for its conservation like its unusual mating ritual, where the male blows bubbles to lure the female.

The male, according to Dr Cambray who has observed its unique spawning behaviour and made a video of this, clears a nest area first before inviting the female to his breeding area. After a number of chases, the pair embrace and adhesive eggs are released.

The pair will mate a number of times after which, the male chases away the female and anything else when he guards his eggs.

South African researcher, Dr Monde Mayekiso who studies the ecology of the Eastern Cape Rocky in the Tyume River, established that the fish bred between October and February.

Unlike most other pisces, the Eastern Cape Rocky prefer quiet rocky habitats where they wedge themselves between rocks or submerged logs and wait for prey items to float or swim past.

The fish (it belongs to the Anabantidae fish family) feeds on invertebrates, crabs, and small fishes and has a greatly elongated swim bladder extending from the caudal peduncle to the head. It grows to 325mm but unlike its African and Asian relatives the East Cape Rocky's accessory breathing organs are labyrinthine but greatly reduced.

A standard Eastern Cape Rocky can have up to 7000 eggs. The eggs are round and have a clear oil globule in the middle of the yolk. At the time they are hatched, young East Cape Rockies are only about 3mm long.

The fish derives its genus names--sandelia bainsii --from Chief Sandile (c1820-1878), the son of a famous 19th Xhosa paramount chief and Andrew Geddes Bain (1797-1864), a road builder, explorer, trader, soldier, writer and the man widely regarded as the father of geology in South Africa.

Its common name, Eastern Cape rocky is because it only occurs in the Eastern Cape province and usually lives in rocky stretches of rivers. Today, it is only found in short sections of six river systems in the area: Kowie, Koonap, the Kat tributaries of the Great Fish river, Keiskamma and Nahoon.

Other members of the anabantidae group in the world occur higher up. The climbing perch (ctenopoma) species is found in East African while the anabas testudineus occurs in Asia.

Sponsors of the Save the Sandelia Bansii campaign include the Worldwide Fund for Nature, Ubuntu Welfare and Development Trust and Flora and Fauna International. Nature Conservation is stocking dams with both the fish and mullet --a small fish species that used to migrate up the Eastern Cape rivers before weirs were built along them. A number of individuals also support the programme.

The campaign involves conservation education programmes, captive breeding of the Eastern Cape Rocky in the upper catchment area where juvenile fish are restocked in three reserves and, rigorous research on the early life history of this species and its habitat.

To help sensitise the local people on the need to also get involved, the project's co-ordinators are involving school, farmers and conservation groups. They are also holding on-site talk and have launched a presidential certificate award. The fish is on display at Albany Museum's Blue Planet gallery.

"It's been one of our biological control success stories," says Dr Cambray who describes himself as the "champion" of the rather unspectacular-looking fish.