The only live “ludong” or “The President’s Fish” in captivity at the Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources research center finally got company as some 40 fingerlings of the fish are also already being cultured at the BFAR.
            The ludong or banak (Cestreus plicailis) is known as “The President’s Fish” as it is the most expensive fish of the Philippines at about P4,000 a kilo. It is very rare and very elusive and is known for its unique taste and peculiar aroma.
            Westly Rosario, BFAR’s interim executive director and the research center’s chief, said “eldest” ludong (mullet) and  the 40 fingerlings donated by Dr. Lino Edralim Lim last January, are undergoing morphological identification (physical traits) and then will also undergo DNA fingerprinting.
            “We have no ludong DNA profile and morphology yet, and we are undertaking this project so we will have basis for other captured fish which look like ludong to find out if they are the real thing,” Rosario said.
            Bfar scientists who are undertaking the morphological study suspect that there are more than one species of ludong, he added.
            He also said that as of present, what the fishers and researchers do is just to guess if the fish they have caught is ludong, an indigenous fish in the Philippines which can be found in the rivers of Caraballo, Cordillera and Sierra Madre Mountains..
            Rosario said that information gathered from fish vendors in Cagayan showed that the volume of ludong catch as well as the sizes are tremendously decreasing annually          
            “It is widely recognized to be a threatened species close to being endangered species of the country,” he said.
            The fish is catadramous or it grows upstream and migrates downstream to spawn. It appears seasonally from 2-6 days a year from October o November after heavy rains and during flashfloods.
            After spawning, the fish travel upstream but the eggs and larvae stay downstream. The fry migrate upstream from December to February during moon phase.
            The first ludong in captivity, about 1.5 kilos, was caught in Cagayan River in Aparri, Cagayan, five years ago and is one of the attractions of the Bfar’s aquarium building.
.           Rosario also said that fishery authorities are shifting their attention to mollusks “as the food of the future” as these are “high value” and can be cultured in degraded environments.
            “We had focused too much on bangus (milkfish) and tilapia, and we are adding mollusks in our research and production activities,|” Rosario said.
            He explained that when water has been polluted, the next species to be cultured would be mollusks such as in Bolinao where tahong (mussels) and oysters already abound. “There used to be no tahong and oysters there, but because of the bangus culture which contributed to marine pollution, mollusks are already cultured in the town.”
The bangus industry lead to production  of algae and bacteria which mollusks eat..
Among the shellfood that the Bfar will focus on are abalone, clams and scallops.
“We are actually already late in mollusks production. Our neighbors in the Asia Pacific have been doing it 20 years ago,” Rosario said.