In addition, they serve as nursery areas and habitats for commercially valuable shrimp and prawns, and for locally consumed fish species and mangrove crabs.
Mudflats are areas where many species of fish, prawns, shellfish, and other marine fauna spawn and feed.
Commercial species including prawns, sardines, mackerels, oil sardines, and some crustaceans are harvested in the region.
The impact of the increasing importance of prawns in fisheries has been felt in estuarine fishing too.
They were isolated for more than six months and during this period fed on frozen mussels and prawns only.
Most species-including prawns and crabs-are popular where seafood has traditionally been easily available.
Particularly, the catches of some major species such as breams, mackerel, prawns, and cephalopods declined over the years.
In contrast to this, according to the upstream fishermen, only those prawns and fishes that escape the fishing nets in the estuarine bar mouth reach them.
