*Kamaro'ay a riyal, awa'ay ko fali.* (No wind when the sea is sitting down.)

This old saying of the A'tolan Amis means that when there is low tide, there is no wind at all. The A'tolan Amis observe and subtly develop their knowledge of the environment. A final piece of common knowledge among the A'tolan Amis for trying to identify whether the conditions are good or not for spearfishing is the question "where is the wind coming from?". Generally speaking, when the wind is coming from the south, the waves are not good for diving because it could be very rough and fish will not leave the reef caves. However, when the wind is coming from the north, it is a good time for fishing and the waves are smoother.

### 3.1.6. Water Temperature and Environmental Change

By diving, spearfishers sense subtle changes in the ocean, especially temperature conditions. In general, the water temperature in the A'tolan marine area is 25 to 26 ◦C. However, at the beginning of 2016, there was a cold snap; it even snowed in the Taipei area. However, the sea temperature in that period was warmer than before. At that time, some spearfishing men were already predicting that a large typhoon would hit. In the end, there were three severe typhoons that hit Taiwan, including Typhoons Nepartak, Meranti, and Megi. Especially, Typhoon Nepartak, with record-breaking strong wind, caused a very serious disaster in the Taitung area in July 2016. At the beginning of 2017, spearfishers sensed that the sea temperature was lower but the land temperature was higher than in the previous year, although they did not use any scientific measuring tools or methods.

The TEK system of A'tolan Amis spearfishers is very complicated and full of details about the local marine area that policymakers, scientists, and environmental NGOs cannot understand without daily practice of diving in the local marine area.

### *3.2. The Management System*

There are persistent governance institutions of the A'tolan Amis that influence local marine-resource management; however, the region is also facing new challenges, such as climate change, tourism development, and chemical pollution from agriculture. In terms of daily practices among A'tolan Amis spearfishing men, they involve informal institutions in which Amis governance is adapting and reshaping customary governance institutions.
