Where do mudskippers live and how are they caught?

The mudskipper, also known as the jumping fish or mud monkey, has tender, delicate, smooth and tasty flesh, and is rich in protein and fat, so the Japanese call it “ginseng of the sea”. So, where do mudskippers live? How are they caught?

1. Where do mudskippers live?

Mudskippers inhabit the brackish waters of estuaries, nearshore mudflats, or low-tide zones with muddy substrate, and have a strong tolerance for poor water quality. They are euryhaline, fond of burrowing, and their burrows are generally Y-shaped, consisting of a passage, a main opening and a rear opening. The main opening is used for entering and leaving, and the rear opening for air exchange. They rely on their pectoral fins and caudal peduncle to crawl or jump on the water surface, sandy beaches and rocks; they lie on the mudflat foraging on benthic diatoms, blue-green algae and fish food, and also eat a small amount of copepods and organic matter.

2. How are mudskippers caught?

The large mudskipper can be caught by hand-catching, cage-catching and hanging-net methods. In hand-catching, after finding a fish burrow, the catcher directly reaches along the passage to catch the fish; its drawback is a lower catch or survival rate. In cage-catching, after finding a fish burrow, the catcher seals the rear opening with mud, inserts the mouth of a fish cage into the main opening, and waits for the fish to come out of the main opening and enter the cage to be caught. The hanging-net method makes use of the large mudskipper's habit of following the tide: first drain the pond to a depth of 2 cm or drain it dry, set up a hanging net at the pond's water inlet, and use the rising tide to slowly add water; the large mudskippers will swim against the current and gather into the hanging net, and the net rope is then pulled to lift and catch them.