The way we catch fish matters a great deal

By Elliott A. Norse
Special to The Times

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Our oceans are in trouble. Crashing populations of our Pacific rockfishes and most of the world's large fishes are just the most visible signs of this. As the oceans decline, everyone, from fishermen to seafood consumers, will feel its effects.
There is reason for hope: On June 4, the Pew Oceans Commission will issue the first comprehensive blue-ribbon report since 1969 on the state of America's oceans.

Leading scientists, fishermen, conservationists and state and local government officials will offer their shared vision of what our oceans could be in the future, and what we can do to put them on the road to recovery.

As both a marine scientist and a consumer who eats what commercial fishermen catch, I hope that this long-awaited report will inspire Americans to think more carefully about how we extract resources from the sea.

This is crucial because, as Seattleite and former U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Administrator William Ruckels-haus noted, "Nature provides a free lunch, but only if we control our appetites."

Unfortunately, we haven't been controlling our appetites. A new study in the journal Nature ("Major fish populations largely gone, study finds; industry challenges global analysis," page one, May 15) shows that commercial fishing has eliminated 90 percent of the large fishes from the world's oceans. Although this process took decades and marine scientists and conservationists provided substantial warning, our government and international institutions have failed to stop it.

Some widely used commercial fishing methods kill far more marine mammals, seabirds and sea turtles than oil spills do. Even worse, some ways that we fish destroy fish habitat, diminishing the capacity of the sea to produce fish.

Methods such as bottom trawling crush and bury corals, sponges and tubeworms. These animals provide the feeding and hiding places that our disappearing cod, rockfishes and many other species need to grow and reproduce. Destroying seafloor habitat-formers is like killing the goose that gives us golden eggs.

I am not saying that fishing is inherently bad. Humans are predators, and if we are going to eat fish, we have to catch and kill them. The alternative — tofu — is not something everyone would willingly substitute for shrimp.

But, as with other things, how we fish counts. Can you imagine thinking, "It doesn't matter how a person reaches the top"? Of course not, and you wouldn't teach that to your kids, either. Or that, "It doesn't matter how we produce wood"? I doubt it, and the timber industry couldn't convince you otherwise.

Similarly, it matters how we catch fish. I've been on a shrimp trawler that — to my dismay — caught and dumped overboard 20 pounds of dead fishes, crabs and starfishes for every pound of shrimp. The next time you order shrimp, think about how many other animals died to support your habit.

Fortunately, some methods of fishing are much more selective. They catch few innocent bystanders, and they don't harm vulnerable seafloor habitats. We should encourage their use.

Which fishing methods and equipment, or gears, are the most and least harmful to the oceans?

Another report, this one prepared by Marine Conservation Biology Institute, answers these questions. Titled "Shifting Gears," it is the first rigorous scientific study comparing the impact of different fishing gears. Its results are based on the judgments of experts: marine biologists, commercial fishermen and marine policy professionals.

Remarkably, the fishery managers, academicians and environmental group scientists we polled agree that, in the U.S., methods such as purse-seining and hook-and-line fishing cause little damage to "non-target" species or fish habitat, while methods such as bottom trawling and bottom gillnetting are much more harmful — as different as logging trees selectively and clear-cutting whole forests.

Another example is spot prawns, which can be caught either by trawling or with pots, which are much less damaging. From California to Southeast Alaska, managers have seen to it that trawling for prawns will cease in the near future. And while swordfishing with driftnets or pelagic longlines kills endangered sea turtles and sharks, it's a no-brainer that harpooning swordfish is more selective — assuming, of course, there are still some swordfish left.

For years, certain members of the fishing industry have been using the excuse that there's not enough scientific information to say which fishing methods are most damaging to the ocean. This excuse should ring hollow from now on.

Healthy oceans are essential for our health and well-being, a fact our policymakers have largely ignored. The Pew Oceans Commission, Nature and "Shifting Gears" reports should be the wake-up call for people whose decisions will determine whether the seas recover or not: our congressional members, fishery managers and all those who love to eat seafood.


Elliott A. Norse is president of Marine Conservation Biology Institute in Redmond. The "Shifting Gears" report prepared by the institute was initiated by The Pew Charitable Trusts and is available at www.mcbi.org.


Copyright © 2003 The Seattle Times Company

This article should give Washington Trout's attorneys a long list of future defendants. Fire up those lawsuits Ramon...Maybe suing some of the problem creators would work better than picking on some of the problem solvers.

Auntym,

There is no longer any high seas interception of salmonoid stocks. There are harvests of Washington salmon on the inshore ocean waters of SE Alaska, British Columbia and Wa. state by commercial trollers and sportfishermen. The sports catch exceeds the commercial ocean harvest of chinook and coho. There is virtually no interception of winter run steelhead anywhere except the rivers.
Adult returns are primarily influenced by stream and ocean survival rates which biologists cannot accurately predict.
Pristine spawning streams and and an adequate return of spawning adults will perpetuate or rebuild runs of both salmon and steelhead. Will that ever happen; probably not.

Slug
I would have to wonder what impact trawling and high seas fishing has on any salmon stocks, By this I am asking, If you drag everything off the bottom in a 100 acre area, what have you done to the food chain. You pointed to habitat loss and destruction on land. What about habitat loss and destruction in the water? I am not familiar with what the fish eat out on the high seas, but I do know in the sound blackmouth are bottomfeeders. And that trawling and other fisheries do have an effect on other links in the food chain(herring). I have a hard time believing that the high seas fishing fleets have no or very little effect on salmon returns. As your wording states that there is no interception of WA salmon on the high seas, I am curious...
Hopefully we can have some dialogue without turning this into the slugfest so typical here,

No ocean interception of salmon and steelhead stocks????????? OH PLEEEEEEEZE

Long lines? bottom draggers? drift nets?

I thought I was reading one of Ramon's posts again...but noooooooo it's a normal member with good intentions. I think I'm going to go lay down. The Coast Guard has intercepted plenty of high seas takes of salmon and steelhead.

I hope what you meant was that their is no LEGAL taking of salmon and steelhead offshore. I hope so.

slug where in the h#$% did you come up with this ( There is no longer any high seas interception of salmonoid stocks ) are you saying there is no longer any highseas fishing or am i missing something here

I recently watched a public service television show in Alaska on monitoring of illegal high seas driftnets. Apparently this is a very highly sophisticated system that relys heavily on aerial observation, radar, GPS and is coordinated between Alaska, Canada and if I remember correctly Japan and Russia. The show concluded that there are a few pirates trying to use high seas drift nets, there are not many left.

The proboem is as the worlld population swels, and the value of ever scarcer fish skyrockets, criminals will be tempted to try to sneak in.

This will only get worse, until we wipe out the valuable fish and then tagret less desirable species. I am very pessimistic about the long term health of our oceans.

JD,
Virtually all salmonoid stocks feed and mature in the N Pacific ocean. Off the top of my head I can't give you the lats.& longs. but they are far off shore. Trawling in Alaska takes place almost exclusively in the relative shallow waters of the Bering sea. The foreign drift net fleets that primarily fish for squid (now) have been moved out of those areas except for an occasional poacher (relatively no impact). Longlines do not target and very infrequently catch salmomoids.
Even from the healthiest of river systems there is no uniformity of adult returns from year to year or cycle to cycle because of the fluctuating mortality rate both in the rivers and on the high seas. Biologists have proven that they cannot predict mortality rates or adult returns.
What is the answer? Very complex I would say.
More on the history of the best salmon hatchery (Minter Creek) in history on another post.

surecatch wish i could of seen that show sounds interesting

slug didnt mean to sound rude in my previous post

aunty m where theres squid theres salmon

Aunty M:

I think you may be right about the lack of nets equating to part of what we have been calling better ocean conditions. But I suspect that like all things with fish the answer may be more complex. From what I read we actually have had better ocean conditions, i.e. cooler water, more food = more salmon. Yet, I think some of our conservation efforts have paid off, there has been a major reduction of the B.C. commercial catch and the U.S. and Canada are both acting more responsibly since they decided to cooperate rather than backstab each other.

Aunty,
maybe I'll learn how to post properly one of these days--anyway.
An example of what can be done is Bristol Bay, Alaska. In the late 1960s and early 1970s sockeye runs there collapsed due to overfishing. The state implimented new management techniques that placed a strict priority on spawner escapement. No fishing was allowed until escapement was a certainty.
Escapement goals (# of salmon) were raised, in some river system to multiples of previous goals. Fishing fleets were moved from mixed stock intercept areas to terminal single river system stock areas. The results were immediate and dramatic. Before 1980 the runs were at and exceeded historic highs. There were harvests in excess of 40 million salmon. Spawning escapement remains a priority and the runs are healthy although not at historic highs due to ocean conditions. This happened prior to the high seas drift net fleets being completely forced off their traditional grounds.
Similiar mangement stategies have had similiar results throughout Alaska. All that was necessary for rebuilding the salmon runs was a pristine spawning envionrment a d sufficient #s of spawners.
Again, is that likely to happen in Wa.--NO.

This is one of the biggest reasons that I have a problem with our hatchery programs.They have kept the state from having to acknowledge the reel problems.If the reel problems would of been dealt with from the begining then we would not be having this discussion because we would be out happily fishing instead of scratching our heads trying to figure out what happened.

Right on slug.
Hey Grandpa,
Why would WT sue any one but WDFW? The commercials, like everyone else, are going to take everything that they legally can. WDFW is charged with managing the fishery not the fisherman.

WT sued WDFW to force compliance with ESA rules concerning hatcheries. By Ramon's own admission they sued for the only provision they could sue for, the "take" portion. On May 9th , 2003 the Settlement Agreement was signed by Kurt Beardslee of Washington Trout and Ernest L. Rushing, senior assistant Attorney General for the state of Washington. On May 12th,2003 Bill Bakke, Director of the Native Fish Society, co-plaintiff. also signed along with all of the other defendants.

This lawsuit only deals with hatcheries. The settlement is 14 pages long and should be read in its entirity by interested parties. Perhaps other future defendants can larn something from this strategy.

WT sued WDFW to force compliance with ESA rules concerning hatcheries. By Ramon's own admission they sued for the only provision they could sue for, the "take" portion. On May 9th , 2003 the Settlement Agreement was signed by Kurt Beardslee of Washington Trout and Ernest L. Rushing, senior assistant Attorney General for the state of Washington. On May 12th,2003 Bill Bakke, Director of the Native Fish Society, co-plaintiff. also signed along with all of the other defendants. Jeffrey Koenings, director of WDFW signed for himself and also signed for all of the WDFW commissioners who were also personally named in the suit.

This lawsuit only deals with hatcheries. The settlement is 14 pages long and should be read in its entirity by interested parties. Perhaps other future defendants can learn something from this strategy. The same group of folks are circling their wagons to sue in Oregon.

There is a provision called : "SUPPORT" which states as follows: " The Parties agree to support this Agreement and not make public statements inconsistent with the spirit of this Agreement."

I have always wondered why everybody is down on the local comercial fishermen.They take,just like the sportsmen only what the wdfw tell them is healthy to take.The state is the one that makes the rules that we abide by.Along time ago it was very apperant that the states quotas were overharvesting our androminous fish and did they stop?No and here we are.

State and federal laws mandate that a viable commercial fishery be promoted in our state. This policy is always the fall back explanation given when commercial fishing overharvest issues are discussed with the WDFW commission and some of the "old guard" commercial advocates at WDFW.