MarineBio Blog

Ocean and seafood lovers unite and spread the word. There is such a thing as sustainable seafood. And organizations such as SeaWeb’s Seafood Choices Alliance and Charting Nature are here to tell you all about it.

Charting Nature donated 100 copies of their informative and beautiful Seafood Guide posters. The posters are available in fish or shellfish and come in two sizes 12 x 36 inches or 24 x 36 inches. The beautifully illustrated posters are designed to help consumers choose sustainable seafood. The posters were illustrated by reknowned artist Brenda Guild Gillespie and the informative content was compiled by the Seafood Choices Alliance. These posters are not only packed with information, they are works of art that would be beautiful in any kitchen - home or commercial.

It’s exciting to know that chefs are beginning to recognize the importance of sustainable seafood, but they’ll be more encouraged to refrain from buying non-sustainable seafood - bluefin tuna for example - if you go into restaurants armed with information. And what better way to keep yourself informed than to gaze at gorgeous illustrations of the seafood that you love?

The fish poster is illustrated with drawings of: Alaska Pollock, Albacore Tuna, Arctic Char, Atlantic Herring, Atlantic Mackerel, Black Sea Bass, Bluefish, Catfish (Farmed), Chinook (King) Salmon, Chum (Dog or Keta) Salmon, Coho (Silver) Salmon, Croaker, Haddock, Mahimahi, Pacific Cod, Pacific Halibut, Pacific Sanddab, Pacific Sole, Pink (Humpback) Salmon, Sablefish (Black Cod),Pacific Sardines, Sockeye (Red) Salmon, Striped Bass (Rockfish), Summer Flounder (Fluke), Tilapia U.S. (Farmed), Wahoo (Ono), Weakfish, White Sea Bass, White Sturgeon (Farmed), Wreckfish, and Yellowfin Tuna (Ahi). There is also information each species’ range, seasons, harvesting methods, cooking and buying tips.

The shellfish poster is illustrated with drawings of: Abalone, Bay and Sea Scallops, Blue Crab, Clams, Crawfish, Dungeness Crab, King Crab, Mussels (Farmed), Northern Pink Shrimp, Oregon Pink Shrimp, Oysters (Farmed), Rock Crab and Jonah Crab, Shrimp (U.S. Farmed), Snow Crab, Spiny Lobster, Spot Prawns (Trap Caught), Squid (aka Calamari) and Stone Crab.

We believe that overfishing is one of the greatest threats to ocean health. But we understand that seafood is an important source of protein and a well-established industry important to the economic-well being of a number of people and regions. The best way to find a happy medium is to be an informed consumer and know which species are sustainable and which ones aren’t.

These posters and the Seafood Choices Alliance are a great place to start. MarineBio will soon be giving away the posters with memberships, stay tuned for details. In the meantime, visit the Seafood Choices Alliance and get seafood smart. Other great resources include:

Blue Ocean Institute’s Guide to Ocean Friendly Seafood
Environmental Defense Fund’s Seafood Selector
Monterey Bay Aquarium’s Seafood Watch
Shedd Aquarium’s Right Bite Program

Image courtesy of Oceana/LX

Because travel is one of life’s greatest pleasures, I often watch the Travel Channel to travel vicariously when I’m not traveling myself. There’s a show that I find interesting for its glimpse into off-the-beaten-path cultures, but not so much for its main focus - the consumption of “bizarre” food. Unfortunately, a recent episode featured the show’s host eating a bowl of shark fin soup - and enjoying it. I didn’t see the episode, but I’m guessing he didn’t mention the plight of sharks while he slurped the soup and allegedly enjoyed it.

This is irresponsible on behalf of the Travel Channel and on behalf of the show’s producers and host. They passed up a perfect opportunity to advocate for sharks rather than contribute to their depletion by promoting the consumption of shark fin soup, which I hear doesn’t taste that great anyway. It’s a status thing. Ugh.

Sharks are essential to the health of the ocean. Period. Why? Well, here’s a recent press release from Oceana with news of a report that will tell us why. And if you want more information, I highly encourage you to see Sharkwater.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: July 24, 2008

Contacts: Dustin Cranor, 202.467.1917 (office), 202.341.2267 (cell) or dcranor@oceana.org
Jasmine Gossett, 202.467.1953 (office) or jgossett@oceana.org

New Report Finds Sharks Critical to Maintaining Healthy Oceans

Shark Populations Threatened by Humans – 100 Million Sharks Killed Worldwide Each Year

Washington, D.C.– A new report released by Oceana today concludes that sharks are invaluable to maintaining healthy ocean ecosystems. Predators as Prey: Why Healthy Oceans Need Sharks shows that as shark populations decline, the oceans suffer unpredictable and devastating consequences.

Sharks have unfortunately fallen victim to the man-hungry “Jaws” stereotype society has created for them. But as Shark Week nears, Oceana wants the world to know that what we should really fear are oceans without sharks. Sharks now represent the largest group of threatened marine species on the World Conservation Union’s (IUCN) Red List of threatened species.

“Humans represent the greatest threat facing sharks today,” said Elizabeth Griffin, marine wildlife scientist at Oceana. “Without proper management and increased enforcement, some shark species are likely to go extinct.”

Threats

Each year, humans kill more than 100 million sharks worldwide. Shark finning alone kills 26 to 73 million sharks annually. Because shark carcasses are bulky, take up a lot of space and are less valuable, they are often thrown overboard. In fact, the practice of shark finning is extremely wasteful and only uses between one and five percent of the shark.

Sharks also are incidentally captured as “bycatch,” a term used for unintended catch, in commercial fisheries. It is estimated that tens of millions of sharks are caught as bycatch each year, which is nearly half of the total shark catch worldwide. When sharks are caught as bycatch they are often thrown overboard, many of them dead or seriously injured.

Effects

As apex, or top, predators of the sea, many shark species are a necessary component to maintaining a complex ecosystem full of diversity and life. These top predators affect other animals in a cascading effect throughout the entire ocean. Sharks feed on the animals below them in the food web, helping to regulate and maintain the balance of life in the ocean. Sharks also can indirectly control the health of coral reefs and the health of seagrass beds, and ultimately, bottom communities.

In addition to regulating species abundance, distribution and diversity, sharks provide essential food sources for scavengers and remove sick and weak individuals from prey populations. Predators as Prey gives a glimpse of what the oceans might look like without sharks: economically important fisheries shut down; coral reefs shift to algae dominated systems; seagrass beds decline; ecological chain reactions are set in motion; and species diversity and abundance decline with the loss of habitats.

“Sharks are undoubtedly critical to maintaining the health of ocean ecosystems,” said Griffin. “Shark populations must be protected and restored to ensure healthy oceans in the future.”

Solutions

Protecting sharks and allowing their populations to recover is critical to restoring the health of our oceans. Oceana’s new report describes three steps that are essential to protecting shark populations worldwide:

* Reduce the number of sharks captured in commercial fisheries through improved shark management, including requiring strict species specific fishing quotas and stock assessments.
* Truly end shark finning by requiring that all sharks be landed whole with their fins still naturally attached.
* Reduce the demand for shark products such as shark fin soup.

The National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) recently took action to better protect sharks by requiring all federally permitted shark fisheries in the Atlantic Ocean and Gulf of Mexico to land sharks with their fins still naturally attached. The U.S. House of Representatives also took action by passing the “Shark Conservation Act of 2008” earlier this month. This legislation will improve existing laws that were originally intended to prevent shark finning and will allow the U.S. to continue being an international leader in shark conservation. Senator John Kerry (D-MA) recently introduced the same legislation in the Senate.

“With time running out for this session of Congress, Oceana looks to the Senate for fast action to enact the Shark Conservation Act of 2008 into law,” said Beth Lowell, federal policy director at Oceana.

For more information about Oceana’s campaign to protect sharks, please visit www.oceana.org/sharks. Sharks photos are available at www.oceana.org/sharks/photos/. For shark footage, please contact Dustin Cranor at 202.467.1917 or dcranor@oceana.org.

Once again, I’m abandoning MarineBio’s policy of striving to remain politically neutral. What is with the Bush administration? First it’s “hey! let’s drill offshore to trick people into thinking it will lower gas prices - it won’t do any good, but my buddies in the oil industry will give me another atta boy!” Now it’s “endangered schmangered - who gives an endangered species behind about endangered species?”

Out of all the headlines in Google news on this topic, US News & World Report’s “Bush to Environment: First Do More Harm” caught my eye. Here’s an excerpt:

The Associated Press obtained a draft proposal of the rule that forced the administration to make public its Neanderthal thinking on a project that it was trying to push through completely beneath the radar. The rule change seeks to bypass normal scientific environmental-impact reviews for construction projects, such as highways, dams, and mines. The Endangered Species Act has until now required federal agencies to consult with scientists at the Fish and Wildlife Service or the National Marine Fisheries Service on whether a project is likely to affect (to wit, harm) any of the 1,353 animal and plant species listed as endangered or threatened.

The draft rules, which do not need to be approved by Congress but are subject to a 30-day public-comment period, would let each agency decide whether a project would harm listed species. This is the functional equivalent of letting the preschoolers take charge of Miss Nancy in Romper Room, instead of the other way round. In case smoke is not yet emanating from your ears, the proposed changes would also prevent federal agencies from assessing the greenhouse gas emissions from construction projects. I guess the thinking went something like: “Let’s pollute the air for humans, too, while we kill off all the animals.”

Now for some good news:

SAN FRANCISCO: The U.S. Navy agreed Tuesday to limit the loud, low-pitched sonar used to detect submarines in response to criticism by environmentalists that the sound was threatening whales and other marine mammals hundreds of miles away.

The settlement in federal court restricts the Navy’s use of low-frequency sonar to specific military training areas near Hawaii and in the western Pacific Ocean.

“When you put that much sound in the ocean, there’s a need to be careful in how you use it and where you go,” said Michael Jasny, a policy analyst with the Natural Resources Defense Council, a plaintiff in the case.

“This agreement succeeds in balancing the Navy’s need to train with the need to protect marine mammals and endangered species in their habitats.”

A Navy spokesman said they were satisfied with the settlement.

In February, U.S. Magistrate Elizabeth Laporte found that low-frequency sonar blasted beneath the ocean’s surface to detect submarines threatens the animals’ ability to find food and avoid predators.

A lawsuit filed by conservation groups last year argued that regulators violated multiple federal environmental laws by issuing a permit allowing the Navy to use the sonar systems around the world.

In some areas where the agreement allows low-frequency sonar, the Navy must limit its use to certain times of the year to protect whale breeding grounds.

The settlement restricts low-frequency sonar to more than 50 nautical miles from Hawaii’s main islands and prohibits training near the Hawaii Humpback Whale National Marine Sanctuary and the Papahanaumokuakea Marine National Monument.

In a separate case, the Navy is asking the U.S. Supreme Court to reconsider a federal appeals court ruling limiting the more widely used mid-frequency sonar in training exercises off Southern California’s coast.

The Navy argues that the decision by the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco threatens the readiness of sailors and Marines while providing limited environmental benefit.

Earlier this year, President George W. Bush issued a waiver exempting the Navy from coastal environmental regulations so training could continue while the Navy appealed a lower court’s decision. But the 9th Circuit sided with the lower court and said the Navy must restrict its sonar training while the case is pending.