Another alien species has been discovered: the 'Butterfish', a forbidden foreign fish that eats aquatic animals in the Sirikit Dam reservoir. Fishermen said they have found Butterfish at the dam for about 10 years. At that time, there were not many, but in the past two years, they have been found more. In the middle of the Sirikit Dam reservoir, Uttaradit Province, the largest earthen dam in Thailand, Mr. Siriwat Bubphacharoen, Governor of Uttaradit, led a group on the Nan River 14 boat heading to the freshwater fishing village, a fish cage farming community inside the Sirikit Dam reservoir after being informed that the Butterfish was spreading in the Sirikit Dam reservoir, affecting the population of all aquatic animals, causing a continuous decrease. He wanted to quickly control the breeding of this type of fish before aquatic animals or local fish become extinct. When the group arrived at the fishermen's raft, they found some butterfish that the villagers had caught. The fishermen living on the raft in the middle of the Sirikit Dam reservoir said that they had found butterfish at the dam for about 10 years. At that time, there weren't many, but in the past two years, they've been found more. Before, river tilapia could be caught in large numbers. Now, there aren't any. What you see are tilapia raised in cages. The fish and other aquatic animals at the dam have been steadily decreasing. Nowadays, out of 100 fish, more than 50% are butterfish. The governor of Uttaradit said that the Butterfish is one of the three foreign fish that the Fisheries Department has banned from being imported, exported or bred since 2018, along with the Blackchinned Tilapia and the Mayan Tilapia. Currently, it has been found breeding in the Sirikit Dam reservoir in Uttaradit Province, causing the original fish species to decrease and replacing some local fish species. Initially, the provincial fisheries and the Phitsanulok Fisheries Center were contacted to urgently survey the growth rate of the fish in the dam to prevent them from entering natural water sources. They also asked the villagers to help as a source of information to inform the outbreak point Source: Thai News Agency
