Dirty Fishing

As promised on Monday, a post devoted to Taras Grescoe’s Bottomfeeder, which I just finished reading.

I’ve heard Grescoe called the “Michael Pollan for the oceans,” and I think that designation is pretty accurate. They are both compelling writers -- Pollan deals with the land and how it feeds us (and how we treat it in return), and Grescoe does the same for the oceans.

I'm a little late on this one, but last Friday the National Marine Fisheries Service announced that as of August 25, 2008, 180,000 square miles of the Bering Sea (that's five times the area of California) will be off-limits to bottom trawling.

In the famed Tokyo fish market, a single Bluefin tuna can fetch $100,000.

Yesterday was a definitely a sad day for the oceans.

Tuesday I watched as the U.S. House of Representatives passed the Shark Conservation Act of 2008. This legislation will require all sharks to be landed with their fins still naturally attached in all U.S. waters. Current laws only require fins and carcasses to be landed in a specific ratio, which does not allow for proper enforcement or data collection.

For a little more than a month, Oceana's vessel the MarViva Med has been roving the Mediterranean documenting and exposing illegal fishing, among other activities, and writing about it on their blog.

This time of year, people flock to the beach - and whisper rumors of shark attacks. As a good Oceana reader knows, shark attacks are incredibly rare, and sharks have much more to fear from humans than vice versa. I've written a column about sharks and beaches for Away.com that you can read here. Don't miss my first column for Away.com on nesting sea turtles.

In honor of World Ocean Day, June 8, Air America Radio's Clout with Richard Greene talked to Oceana CEO Andy Sharpless and Oceana board member/actor Ted Danson. Check it out!

Part 1 : Sharpless discusses the importance of World Ocean Day.
Part 2 : Sharpless explains Oceana's five major campaigns.
Part 3 : Freedivers Martin Stepanek and Niki Roderick talk about their personal connection to the ocean.
Part 4 : Ted Danson discusses his longtime commitment to ocean conservation.
Part 5 : Danson elaborates on the importance of sea conservation.

It’s been said over and over again: Eastern bluefin tuna cannot handle the pressure they face from overfishing. These sleek and powerful fish are unlucky enough to be among the world’s most coveted seafood species, and for years scientists have called for a moratorium as a last-ditch effort to save these genetically pure, irreplaceable creatures. While strict quotas have been in place for years, poor quota enforcement and illegal fishing have driven the bluefin to the brink of extinction.

On Monday, the European Union ended the fishing season for most of the Mediterranean’s purse seine fleet, the ships that are responsible for 70 percent of the Med’s caught tuna. This move could save up to 100,000 bluefin this year alone.

Oceana has been carefully monitoring the purse seine fleet with our new boat, the MarViva Med. We have recorded rarely-seen images of bluefin fattening pens and documented purse seiners illegally using spotter planes in their pursuit of the fish.

I didn’t anticipate that the E.U. would react so quickly and shut down the season well before its original July 1 end date. But our work is far from over. The next step is to make sure that the closure is enforced, and that non-E.U. fishing outfits don’t start targeting tuna as well. We will be watching.

The most popular story right now on current.com is about shark finning, a horrific practice that most people know nothing about, and that Oceana is campaigning to stop. Millions of sharks are indiscriminately killed every year to satiate a growing hunger for shark fin soup, a delicacy in some countries.

Finning isn't the only challenge sharks are up against. Sharks are also caught for meat and as bycatch. Click here to access an exclusive Oceana slideshow of images of shark fishing around the world, including finning.