Captain Agui Leads Dive Teams to Clear Ghost Nets and Protect Coral Fish
Having grown up watching his father dive and fish, Chen Chih-kuei sensed beneath the waves the reality that "the catch gets worse every year," and also witnessed the undersea tragedy of discarded fishing nets killing marine life by mistake. So he put away his speargun, picked up net-clearing tools, and devoted himself to ocean cleanup work for a full ten years. Now he puts his diving expertise to use, switching to work as an instructor and taking guests on underwater tours, promoting the idea that "leaving fish in the sea is more valuable." This year he received recognition as a "Model Fisherman," and he hopes his own experience can inspire more fishermen to change.
The Most Veteran Dive Instructor, Running a Local Business for Forty Years
Chen Chih-kuei, nicknamed "Captain Agui," has dark skin and a smile like a boy who has never quite grown up. Warm and outgoing by nature, he is like the sun of Little Liuqiu, radiating energy all day long.
At eight in the morning, Captain Agui's first boat leaves the harbor, not to fish but to carry dive customers out to sea. "Today we're taking everyone to see sea turtles!" On board he explains the underwater terrain of the area in detail, and does not forget to remind everyone of the precautions for getting in the water. He also arranges guided dives according to each student's preferences: "Some people like to see shipwrecks and fish schools, some come specifically to take photographs. The seabed is so vast, you have to first understand the purpose of the dive before you can arrange a suitable trip."
Chen Chih-kuei has been taking guests diving for 26 years. His family's dive shop holds Little Liuqiu's first recreational fishing boat registration and has been operating locally for nearly forty years. The shop's air tanks have grown from just over 30 at the start to more than 800 today, and the scale is so large that in peak tourist season other dive shops have to ask them to allocate tanks for use. "Back then, when people went to Little Liuqiu they would say they wanted to find 'Turkey' to dive. 'Turkey' was my dad's nickname, or they'd say they were looking for 'Turkey's son.'"
Because diving is a high-cost activity, in the past only the well-off had the chance to take in the underwater scenery, and at the time Little Liuqiu had not yet made a name for itself as a tourist destination, so it was common to take only one or two customers a day. Over the decades, through word of mouth among locals and tourists alike, the family dive shop's reputation gradually spread. But when it comes to how the father and son first got into diving, it was not actually because they saw booming business opportunities in tourism.
Spearfishing Reveals the Ocean's Tragedy: Ghost Nets Are Highly Destructive
From childhood he followed his father along the Little Liuqiu shore to fish. His father would put on simple scuba gear and go into the sea to catch coral reef fish, and at 13 Chen Chih-kuei had to practice piloting a bamboo raft and "follow his father's bubbles" on the surface. His father was hospitable and often entertained friends with dives, and one day, on a friend's suggestion, he started a small "dive club" business. But at the time "there weren't many customers, and we still had to feed the whole family," so fishing remained the household's main trade.
"Anyone who fishes knows that the fish here get fewer every year!" After graduating from junior high school, Chen Chih-kuei went to the main island to look for work, and at 20 he returned to his hometown and once again put on his scuba gear to go into the sea, only to find there might not be any fish to catch: fish schools no longer came near the shore, and there were many more discarded fishing nets in the sea.
He describes how nets hundreds of meters long inevitably break when being hauled in, and the remaining gear simply sinks to the seabed. Fishing nets are made of fiberglass, which does not rot or break down easily. Some get caught among the reefs and form a wall, threatening the fish that swim past. Whales, dolphins and sea turtles are also often seen trapped and unable to move, sometimes suffocating to death because they cannot return to the surface to breathe.
In addition, discarded fishing nets and ropes easily cover entire coral reefs, preventing the coral from photosynthesizing and causing it to die, which in turn affects the fish and creatures that live in symbiosis with the reef. "If you dive often, you know there really are a lot of 'ghost nets' hurting innocent fish. They are the visible killers in the sea!" Discarded waste severely threatens the living environment of marine life and also accelerates the depletion of fishery resources.
