Shem Creek fisherman – along with a lot of other ones – are traveling to Washington this month to attend a nationwide rally protesting new fishing regulations that limit bottom fishing.

That’s fine, but I consider it a waste of gas on their part. If all the fish are gone, what would they do then? Once there’s proof things are okay, the government will loosen their restrictions, and we’ll all be able to enjoy fishing again.

Legare Smith, captain of a private sport fishing boat, says “What if they come back and say dolphin or wahoo numbers are down?” Well, then it must be because their numbers are too low to sustain themselves, they’re certainly not trying to drive away our tourism dollars!   Read more...

In a paper just published Science Magazine, a team of fisheries led by Boris Worm, a marine biologist at Canada’s Dalhousie University, provided the most comprehensive analysis to date of global fisheries. The findings are mixed.

In 5 of 10 well-studied regions — Iceland, Newfoundland-Labrador, the Northeast U.S., Southeast Australia, and the California Current — fishing pressures have on average become less intense. 1/3 of all fish populations have been steered away from imminent doom, and appear to be recovering. Their ecosystems are no longer fast-tracked for collapse.

The solutions were relatively simple: abandon destructive fishing techniques like longlining and bottom trawling, reduce catches, put some waters off-limits, and give fishermen an economic reason to not overfish.   Read more...

NOAA’s Fisheries Service is holding a series of public meetings this summer seeking comments on potential changes in the way commercial and recreational fishermen fish the U.S. quotas for swordfish and bluefin tuna in the Atlantic.

In the case of both fish stocks, U.S. fishermen have not been able to catch the U.S. quotas designed to ensure that the stocks are fished sustainably. While these species are managed internationally, the United States manages the domestic part of these fisheries by taking into account the ecosystem and working to reduce bycatch of turtles and other species. This approach increases expenses for U.S. fishermen and makes it more difficult for them to compete in the marketplace with cheaper imports from fishing nations that subsidize their fleets and do not use an ecosystem approach.   Read more...

The world’s first major documentary about the devastating effect of overfishing premiered at the 2009 Sundance Film Festival.

“Overfishing is the great environmental disaster that people haven’t heard about”
– producer George Duffield.

In the film we see firsthand the effects of our global love affair with seafood – from right here on Shem Creek, all the way to the world’s biggest consumers of seafood: Asians, Japan specifically.

The documentary examines the imminent extinction of bluefin tuna, brought on by increasing western demand for sushi; the impact on marine life resulting in huge overpopulation of jellyfish; and the profound implications of a future world with no fish that would bring certain mass starvation.   Read more...