SWAMPY TALES

Does it sound surprising whenever news of collapsing houses in Lunga hit headlines in various media? To some of us, this is no strange news at all. It is merely the fulfillment of what is anticipated. What is surprising is a reporter reporting a disaster of 268 ruined houses showing footage of firmly built fishing camps instead of distressed families or actual ruins. Everyone knows that islands are prone to flooding whenever you have rains above normal. Our seasons are predictable. We exactly know that we will have rainy season from November to March. We also know the conditions under which inhabitants of the islands live during this period. In other words, we anticipate an annual disaster in the same way we wait for Christmas. Also, everyone knows that the majority of people living on these islands are poor; who live below poverty datum line. This means that they cannot afford decent housing on their own and so live in huts that are easily washed away leaving them in distr...

Away from nets, another known and popular mass-fishing method has been in use around Bangweulu swamps for a very long time. Fish weirs; which are basically barricades. Construction of fish weirs, locally termed ‘ Ukucilika amaamba ,” ( ukucilika simply meaning barricading) is another ancient commercial and reliable fishing method used by many fishermen.  Fishers who use this method may not use other fishing gear such as seine or gill nets but rely heavily on their amaamba to catch as much fish as they need for their livelihood. In other words, they specialize in this form of fishing.  Though the method is not unique to Bangweulu, as it is used in many other countries such as India, it's the kind of ensnaring used that is different.   Usually, here, this method is used when water floods during the rainy season and later when it recedes after spawning period. You may find fish weirs in deep waters while others are constructed in shallow waters such as...

This post is a continuation of where we ended in 2019, giving you highlights of life in the Bangweulu Swamps, and Lunga in particular. We started talking about fishing, the mainstay of the people in the area and we resume to continue discussing some of the methods employed to earn a living. Let’s talk about the seine net. A seine net is of historical importance in the business of commercial fishing. It is said to be the fishing method employed by the fishermen that later turned fishers of men during the time of Jesus Christ. It is one of the mass-catch methods of old that is also used in the Bangweulu Swamps today. “Seines hold a special honor in the Bible. Of all the nets mentioned in the Bible, the seine is mentioned more than any other, a total of nine times. In the Old Testament, written in Hebrew, the word for seine was "Herem" while in the New Testament, written in Greek, the word was "Sagene" from which we probably get the English word seine .” ...

Would you tell the origins and character of a man by the piece of cloth he hangs around his neck? Nor would you, by the way he polishes his boot?    Not until you get him to talk about himself. Otherwise, you will be judging a book by its cover. In this post, I digress from telling you about the how to of fishing, just to break the monotony. I present to you a bite of my true story having grown up in two spheres of one Bangweulu Swamps. It’s a portion of hardships, probably not so different from any other Unga and Bisa child brought up in a poor rural setting. Ng’ungwa lies at the very edge of the Bangweulu Swamps in the east and is famous for hosting coveys of black lechwes, sitatungas and the famous shoebill stork. It forms a boundary between the Bu-Bisa main land of Chief Chiunda Ponde and the Ba-Unga swamps of Chief Bwalya Mponda. It is home to Chikuni, a Ramsar Site , recognized as a Wetland of   international importance;   and also as an I...

In Ci- Unga language , Ukulalikisha simply means to let something stay overnight. If a person is staying in a place for a night, we say ukulaala or ukulinda, the same word used for waiting. From ukulaala comes ukulalikisha, which can also literally mean to delay. As you read this post today (23 rd December 2019, the fish ban is in full force (from December- March). Some researchers think this is unnecessary given the sources, breeding and life cycle of fish in the swamps. However, laws must be obeyed for, in most cases, they are made with good intentions that tend to benefit citizens. At the end of the ban, especially from April to August, most fishermen will be using Amalalikisha as their preferred technique of fishing. Amalalikisha is just another commercial stationary gillnet fishing system we employ to catch different kinds of fish, mostly the cichlid species, nswikashi ; by letting nets in water for a night. (Catfish is also caught this way). The type and size o...

Of the commercial fishing methods, ukusebesha is one of the most prominent. Ukusebesha simply means setting your nets and wait by. You normally wait near the nets such that after many fish have gilled, you remove it and set your nets again. The process can be repeated as many times as possible, depending on the type of fish and time of the day. The most talked about type of ukusebesha method by most Researchers is that done in the evening and early in the morning concerning nocturnal Mormyridae kind of fish such as Marcusenius macrolepitodus ( Mintensa ) and Petrocephalus simus (C ise ). What they call Ukusakila lupata (Ichikawa 1985 and Ichiro 1987) where you find a school of impata, set your net and drive them to it during the day is also termed as ukusebesha impata in Lunga. To catch mintesa by this method, we first of all identify their hide-out which is almost always underneath a floating island (lufunsu) otherwise known as mukoma.   They will take cover in...

    Almost every Unga man you meet in and around the Bangweulu swamps, or indeed anywhere in the world, is a typical fisherman. Our main economic activity is fishing, and so, we are into it as soon as we start crawling. It is no wonder we are sometimes mockingly referred to as ba Tubulu , meaning one who spends most of his time in water and, therefore, even relieves himself therein. It is estimated that twenty-three per cent of the fish consumed in the Copperbelt Province of Zambia is procured from Lunga. This goes to show that we possess unmatched expertise in fishing, which I discuss in a series of posts starting with this one. Research shows that we have over 80 fish species, which calls for various ways of catching it. As in any other trade, you need to know what you want to achieve in order to employ a particular system to achieve your goal. As fishermen, we also employ several fishing methods and tools to get the type of fish we desire. We, therefore, adopt s...