By Marian Z. Codilla
Cebu Daily News
7:12 am | Thursday, March 28th, 2013
Blame it on a high demand for non-meat dishes on Holy Week and illegal hunters.
A 60-kilo manta ray was confiscated yesterday from a stall in Pasil market in barangay Suba, Cebu City.
Illegal fishers, who hunt the protected species in seas between Bohol and Cebu, tried to slip the large manta ray in Cebu City’s biggest fish market.
It was already cut up in three parts and encased in plastic when it was put on display.
“We were waiting for the owner to arrive but no one came to claim it. The stall owner said the fish was just placed there,†said Maria Merlyn Catipay, OIC of the fisheries division of the Cebu City Department of Veterinary Medicine and Fisheries.
At first glance, the pectoral fins looked like the ordinary tail of a fish displayed without its head.
The manta ray was spotted by a roving inspector of the DVMF.
The stall owner told Catipay he knew the animal was a protected species and left it unwrapped.
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