Down to Earth Blog

Collapse of Nova Scotia Fisheries: In today's Washington Post, outdoors columnist Angus Phillips has a good piece about overfishing, "A Sea Barren of Fish Carries a Message Awash in Warning." In it, he describes how in Murphy's Cove, Nova Scotia, people their no longer fish for a living, because there are no fish. The last five generations fished out the huge stretch of continental shelf near Nova Scotia. The locals say all they catch now are lobsters; the harbors are empty of fishing boats and all but one seafood processing plant has shut down.

Phillips writes that the same thing happenedon the Grand Banks to the east -- all fished out after being the "greatest cod fishery known to man." He then segueways into a warning for the Chesapeake Bay, near where I live, and its fish. He asks if a comparatively smaller fishing area, like the Bay, can surive the pressures of commercial fishing if huge fishing grounds like Nova Scotia and the Grand Banks did not.

I'm posting this to indicate that bad things do happen when environmental resources are not managed, when no thought is given to the future. I hope the Bay fishery can be managed well going forward.

For a guide to seafood that comes from sustainably-managed fisheries, see this EarthEasy.com site. You can print out a seafood guide card at this Audubon site.

Technorati Tags: Angus Phillips, Chesapeake Bay, Fishing

|  Add to del.icio.us |  digg this