Yangshuo Cormorant Fishing Custom

Cormorant fishing is a fisher craft kept alive along the Li River for more than a thousand years: Yangshuo fishermen sit on a single bamboo raft, light a lantern or torch at its head to draw the light-loving fish together, and release trained cormorants to dive and catch them, the points of lantern light on the night river forming one of the eight famed scenes of Yangshuo. The Yangshuo cormorant fishing custom is on the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region ICH list.

From dusk into the night the fisherman poles his raft out, first luring the fish with lantern light, then slipping a ring around the cormorant's neck so it cannot swallow the larger catch; at a word the birds dive one after another and surface with fish in their beaks, and the fisherman lifts the catch into his basket, man and bird working in ready concert across the living scene of a Li River night.

Yangshuo cormorant fishing is a living fossil of the Li River's fishing civilization and the central performance of the Li River Fishing-Lantern Festival held since 1999, carrying the layered memory of fisher livelihood, the bond between man and bird and the lore of festival, and standing as Yangshuo's most recognisable heritage symbol.

Cormorant fishing and the fishing-lantern night scene can be seen along the Li River at Xingping and Yulong village of Baisha in Yangshuo.