By: Dana Sackett More than 2 years have passed since the BP–Deepwater Horizon rig spill caused more than 200 million gallons of oil and 1.8 million gallons of dispersants to be dumped into the Gulf of Mexico. Despite being one of the largest oil spills in history, the Gulf fisheries were back in business only…
Category: Threats to Fisheries
Why do native plants matter?
Plants are often overlooked as important contributors to the long term health and integrity of aquatic systems. As a result, impacts to riparian areas as well as invasive vegetation introductions have had devastating impacts on fish populations across the globe. For example, Appalachian brook trout were once found in abundance from Canada to Georgia along…
Coral calls for help and fish respond
By: Dana Sackett An interesting symbiotic relationship (defined as a close and often long-term interaction between two or more species) highlighted in a recent Science article demonstrates the delicate balance between species in aquatic ecosystems and how chemicals can be used to harm and benefit both corals and fish. Here I discuss this article and…
Hurricane Impacts on Fish
By Steve Midway As the Northeast US continues to recover from Hurricane Sandy, we are all reminded of the danger that hurricanes (now in some cases “superstorms”) pose. And with the admonishment that such storms might be stronger and/or more frequent in the future, we will all need to increasingly consider the negative impacts of…
Rotenone: the fish killer
By Dana Sackett Rotenone has been used for centuries by fishermen to harvest fish. More recently, scientists and fishery managers have used rotenone to sample fishes and remove unwanted species from freshwater systems. But how does this toxic chemical work so effectively to kill fish, is it toxic to other species including humans, and…
Bottom of the barrel – Expansion of fishing to the deep sea is not sustainable
By: Dr. Jeff Drazen Department of Oceanography University of Hawaii Over the last 50-60 years many shallow water fish stocks have become depleted and others have outright collapsed. As a result fishers have targeted fish stocks in deeper and deeper waters. Studies on global catch have shown that the average depth of catch has increased…
Trophic downgrading
By: Dana Sackett While visiting the Monterey Bay Aquarium for the first time, I was reminded of an article in Science discussing the consequences of globally removing large apex predators from our ecosystems. Below I share some information from my visit and from this article. I walked up to the renowned three-story display of the…
Small things can make a big difference
By: Dana Sackett You may have noticed that many everyday products are much smaller than they were a few decades ago, with cell phones being a perfect example. Every now and then you may catch a glimpse of those archaic brick phones in a rerun of Saved by the Bell and get a good laugh…
Fracking: The Final Part
We have recently deviated from the usual diet of fisheries-related themes, but our recent report on fracking received more momentum than expected. In return, we gained the attention of a licensed geologist. Here we share his forward projections about the fracking issue. A geologist’s thoughts on fracking Simon Kline, Licensed Geologist in the State of North Carolina…
Where is Captain Planet when you need him?
By: Dana Sackett I briefly provided some background on this weeks topic in a previous blog (“Surrounded by poisons; understanding the world fish face in today’s aquatic environment”). Here I expand on that subject. Clutching the bottle of water I had just collected from the Pee Dee River, I climbed the steep embankment back to…
Captain America Sells Vote For Fracking
By Patrick Cooney CAPTAIN AMERICA SELLS VOTE TO ALLOW FRACKING IN NORTH CAROLINA As a “follow up” to Fracking Harms Fish, this article discusses the politics surrounding fracking in North Carolina. As such, this is not one of our normal weekly fisheries related posts with The Fisheries Blog. Please feel free to leave constructive comments…
Fracking Harms Fish Through the Halliburton Loophole
(Credit: Gasland) Before we begin to grasp the impacts of Fracking on fish, let’s take a quick look at an energy boom that swept the continent and world more than a century ago that presented similar challenges. Like a scene in a cheesy 80’s movie, my family pushed south on Interstate 5 on our annual journey through California’s Central Valley…
Cutthroat Conservation: Saving the Yellowstone Ecosystem
Yellowstone cutthroat trout deserve intense focus. (Photo: Patrick Cooney) An elusive Lamar River Yellowstone cutthroat trout was the target for my only fishing day in Yellowstone National Park, and an early autumn sow-bellied beauty was eyeing my offering. As my eyes intensely focused on the golden prize, and my finger balanced delicately on the line like a needle…
Trout, a canary in the phosphate-mine
By: Dana Sackett Recent debates on fish selenium toxicity due to mining operations in southern Idaho have brought to light selenium’s toxic effects on fish populations and the various views on selenium policy from different environmental constituents (e.g., industry, Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS), Forest Service, Idaho Department of Environmental Quality,…
Book Review: Overfishing
Overfishing: What everyone needs to know Ray Hilborn, with Ulrike Hilborn Many fisheries scientist know that it’s hard to use an often unqualified term like ‘overfishing’. The specifics of overfishing mean many things to many people, but a general definition would be fishing a stock beyond its ability to produce maximum biomass or profit. (See,…
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