A multi-million pound shoal of endangered bluefin tuna are claimed to have been spotted off the coast of Cornwall, sparking fears of illegal poaching.
Duncan and Hannah Jones, who own Marine Discovery Penzance, a wildlife cruise, spotted what they said was a 500-strong shoal of the 7ft-long fish, believed to be worth hundreds of millions of pounds, last Saturday.
They captured images of the fish and wrote on their website: “This year seems to keep turning up the unexpected. Today Mount’s Bay was invaded by a . . . shoal of bluefin tuna.
“It was spectacular to watch them erupting at the surface! We also saw harbour porpoises, ocean sunfish, grey seals and a variety of seabirds.”
British fishermen, who have no allocated quota for tuna, have been warned that it is illegal to catch the fish in these waters. France, Spain and Greece are allowed to land them — and only up to July. The bluefin can fetch up to £1 million a piece on the Japanese market.
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Paul Trebilcock, chief executive of the Cornish Fish Producers Organisation, said: “We do get the odd bluefin tuna but a [big shoal] seems highly unlikely. Even if they are out there, we couldn’t land them anyway.”
Bluefin tuna are rarely seen in the sea around Britain and are more common in the Mediterranean and Atlantic.