About thirty years ago, diners around the world developed a taste for the low-fat white meat of a large pelagic fish known as a slimehead. The name was changed to orange roughy, and a delicacy was born.
Unfortunately for the orange roughy, its long lifespan (a hundred years or more) and its late arrival to sexual maturity (at 20 years or more) has made it vulnerable to overfishing. As its popularity in fine restaurants has grown, orange roughy populations have nosedived. And just this week, Australia and New Zealand (the world's largest producer of orange roughy, while the U.S. is the largest consumer) agreed to close a large orange roughy fishery in the Southern Ocean, with managers saying they're not sure when or if the area may ever reopen to fishing because of the damage done.
It doesn't have to come to this. With responsible fishing techniques and sustainable quotas, rare and increasingly rare commercial fish like the roughy, bluefin tuna, Patagonian toothfish (Chilean sea bass), and more can thrive.
How industry pressures and competing national agendas dim prospects for a climate treaty
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Biodiversivist Posted 12:30 pm
07 Dec 2007
In the end, it all comes down to biodiversity. Poison Darts--Protecting the biodiversity of our world
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caniscandida Posted 8:56 pm
07 Dec 2007
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Today we know more about orange roughy and the environmental impacts of bottom-trawling and its affects on marine ecosystems. It is possible that we may not open this fishery again in the foreseeable future in order to protect the sea floor environment as well as the orange roughy that live above it.
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This is a perfect example of how conservation of species should work, in principle: species should always be recognized as being part of their ecosystems, and attempts to save an individual species will necessarily amount to saving its ecosystem as well.
But I am increasingly doubtful that, in reality, in all too many cases, even the most enlightened efforts of governments to regulate fisheries can have much good effect. As BioD says, it will be difficult and expensive to enforce a prohibition of fishing in a region of the high seas; poachers will always find a way. And, it seems to be one of the many evils of this world, that when a species has attention called to it on account of its rarity, hunters and collectors are all the more enflamed to try to acquire the last few.
When he was invited by Erik Hoffner a couple of weeks ago to write something for us about the state of the Atlantic bluefin fishery, Carl Safina seemed strongly to suggest that consumers' demands can indeed affect the price of fish, and the habits of fishermen. That makes sense.
Chickens are our cousins! So are fish! So are other sentient animals! Let us learn to be kind.
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Blueplanet Posted 12:50 am
08 Dec 2007
Here is an example of what overfishing is doing to our seas (even though the experts seem to be being very coy about the 'elephant in the room').
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/main.jhtml?xml=/earth/20 ...
http://www.blueplanetsociety.org
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caniscandida Posted 1:22 am
08 Dec 2007
I am not denying that certain fisheries ought to be closed, especially for overfished slow-breeding animals such as orange roughy and Patagonian toothfish. And organizations such as Oceana and Blue Planet, which work to put such measures into effect, should certainly not desist. But given the nature of the task, such measures will always be difficult to make effective, in a number of ways.
Also, so far as they go, the consumer is treated as a passive non-participant. It would seem that a thorough-going program of educating consumers of seafood about what they are offered to eat ought also to be effective, in addition to direct regulation of fisheries.
For example, in the case of orange roughy, it is amazing that those fish can live well beyond a century. And so the experience of eating one becomes rather shocking and horrible, if the diner realizes that the fish there on the table either is older than he or she is, perhaps by a good bit, or else it might have lived to a very old age if it had not been caught.
Chickens are our cousins! So are fish! So are other sentient animals! Let us learn to be kind.
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Biodiversivist Posted 2:12 am
08 Dec 2007
I see anti-smoking ads fairly regularly. There is no profit in that either. But, they are proof that ads for the public good can be done. I would like to see similar ads educating people about the ramifications of their diet, both on themselves and on the environment.
Hopefully the ads would pass some kind of science based litmus test so they are accurate and don't end up being greenwashed bullshit like 99% of other ads.
In the end, it all comes down to biodiversity. Poison Darts--Protecting the biodiversity of our world
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caniscandida Posted 2:28 am
08 Dec 2007
Anyway, ads are not the entirety of education. What I specifically have in mind is more face-to-face contact, appropriate to dining situations here in NYC, where many people go to restaurants not far from where they live, and where many can be counted on to have at least some awareness of ecological issues.
Chickens are our cousins! So are fish! So are other sentient animals! Let us learn to be kind.
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ThomC Posted 7:09 am
08 Dec 2007
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Sam Wells Posted 7:57 am
08 Dec 2007
Too often out successes are diminished by bad information that says all fisheries are just no good, all the time.
Atlantic cod, my goodness, has come back enough for limited hook and line fishing, a major cause for celebration. Swordfish - remember those? - are coming back although U.S. boats aren't landing them. Dogfish, a species of shark most often used for "fish and chips" in England, are so thick in some areas you can't catch anything else. Because of regulations and high diesel costs, white and brown shrimp have made a major come-back in the Gulf of Mexico.
There is plenty of fish to eat, and may I suggest for the "mercury-sensitive" that ocean dolphin fish (Mahi-Mahi) has almost non-detectable amounts.
I'm not saying that "if you don't know anything about fishing shut up" but if we lose our domestic fishing fleets, you'll be exposed to illegal and mostly tainted imports. Don't buy Orange Roughy, you silly, those are not domestic US fish. I plead and ask us not to give up on a major source of protein that our country could use.
We need more oysters, clams as well. Some estimates were that the oysters located near New York City at one time could process and clean more water than what came down the Hudson River. When the Hudson became polluted and the oysters died, the entire ecosystem died. They're trying to bring back the oysters and sea grasses now, and clams are doing fairly well in lower New York Bay.
We need better water management for the sturgeons, catfish, and other residents of our rivers as well. And people are working on it really, really hard. Come on, give us some credit to a mere blip of an uptick, a mere hint of species recovery, as we work so hard trying to save our fisheries and our native history. /sam
Onward through the fog
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Erik Hoffner Posted 12:19 am
09 Dec 2007
So, good and bad news both.
While I value a domestic fishing fleet, I don't really want to support it with my tax dollars when it's wrecking ocean bottom habitat, scooping up too many high on the food chain critters, or worse, depleting the food chain in the case of harvesting way too much menhaden and sea herring.
The Orion Grassroots Network: 1,100+ grassroots groups working for conservation & more
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