Life finds a way
Tzeng is happy to share all of his more than 35 years of fish ladder experience. He has even traveled to China’s Qinghai Province to teach Tibetans about fish ladders, helping hundreds of millions of fish travel upstream every year to spawn.
But Tzeng hasn’t limited his focus to fish. When designing the Long’en Wier fish ladders, he also took note of the Touqian River’s mitten crabs (Eriocheir hepuensis). His study of their activity cycles and movements led him to incorporate rows of grooves and ropes along the fish ladders’ curtain walls to enable the crabs to crawl past the weir.
In 2017, Tzeng won a grant from the Keep Walking program that took him to Pingtung’s underprivileged Manzhou Township. The area is known for its abundant terrestrial crabs, but the proliferation of roads has been causing massive slaughter of the crabs when they migrate from inland areas to the coast to spawn in the summer and fall. Tzeng took his students with him to Manzhou and led them through the whole process of designing, assembling, observing and monitoring a system of wildlife corridors for the crabs. Tzeng’s work on the project led National Geographic magazine’s Taiwan edition to honor him as one of its three 2017 “explorers.”
In 2018, the Kenting National Park Administration hired him to create similar wildlife corridors for terrestrial crabs along the coastal Provincial Highway 26 in Kenting. Tzeng used canvas walls and culverts to create very successful “crab corridors,” but the effort was halted in mid-2019. Sighing as he recalls the project, he says: “Every attempt has imperfections. There’s always something that can be improved. We have to learn from our experiences, not give up entirely.” He adds that many fish species need their own wildlife corridors. “If you know of a fish species in need, you have to address that need and work hard to make the infrastructure a success. That’s the only way to truly resolve these issues.”
Having spent so many years studying fish, Tzeng often finds himself moved by them. “They’re truly amazing!” He relates the old story of Chiang Kai-shek finding inspiration as a child in watching fish swim upstream against a strong current. “I once visited President Chiang’s hometown in Zhejiang Province to consult with local fish experts, who confirmed the phenomenon. Unfortunately, pollution has pretty much brought it to an end.”
In fish, Tzeng has observed a spirit of striving and perseverance. In Tzeng, we have similarly seen an ecologist passionate about the natural world and tireless in his pursuit of knowledge.
A marbled eel elver (Anguilla marmorata).
Fish ladders enable aquatic species to swim upstream past man-made obstacles, maintaining the abundance and biodiversity of river ecosystems. (courtesy of Tzeng Chyng-shyan)
Tzeng Chyng-shyan has taught Tibetans to design fish ladders, helping hundreds of millions of fish return upstream to spawn. (courtesy of Tzeng Chyng-shyan)
Tzeng has devoted his life to saving ecosystems by building fish ladders that let fish find their way home. (photo by Kent Chuang)