Dolphin Wall Net (DWN) - an innovative management measure devised by ring seine fishermen of Kerala-India to reducing or eliminating marine mammal-fishery interactions

Information on the use of Dolphin Wall Nets (DWN) by fisherman in Kerala, India was presented in this paper.  The DWN was designed by these fishermen to reduce dolphin attacks during fishing operations. Specifically humpbacked dolphins tend to congregate in fishing areas, surrounding the ring seine net and removing fish from the net.  This net design can be used by fishermen instead of crackers, which can cause harm to the dolphins. The authors provided fishermen from four stations in Kerala, India (Kasargode, Kozhikode, Ernakulum and Kollam) questionnaires to fill out. The questionnaires were designed to collect information on ring seine fishing operations, dolphin attacks and the structural details of the DWN when it was used.  The authors presented results on the structure of the DWN used by these fishermen but did not report any information regarding differences in bycatch rates between regular ring net operations and those using DWN.