Trails of Destruction: The Impact of Bottom Trawling as Seen from Space
by Jeremy Elton Jacquot, Los Angeles on 02.22.08
Image courtesy of SkyTruth
Arguably the single most destructive human action for the world's oceans, bottom trawling, a practice commonly used to dredge up deep water fish, leaves behind a trail of destruction that can clearly be seen from space. The above image of the Gulf of Mexico, captured by the Landsat satellite in late 1999, shows the sediment trails left behind by individual ships (the bright spots) - a testament to the utter devastation the practice exerts on vast seafloor ecosystems.
Les Watling, a zoologist at the University of Hawaii who was interviewed by LiveScience's Andrea Thompson, said that bottom trawling drags the equivalent of an area twice the size of the combined lower 48 states each year. The sediment plumes arise as ships drag their nets across the ocean floor, moving rocks, crushing reefs and stirring up various marine organisms.
Watling described these plumes as just the "tip of the iceberg," explaining that most trawling takes place in waters deep enough to mask the plumes from sight. He presented the results of his work at the AAAS meeting in Boston alongside John Amos of SkyTruth, the West Virginia-based remote sensing and digital mapping non-profit group that tracked the plumes.
Via ::Deep Sea News: Trawling Effects Seen From Space (blog)
See also: ::Picture worth 1000 Words Dept: Chinese Trawlers, ::Panel Votes To Ban Bottom Trawling in Northern Bering Sea
They won't be happy until the last minnow is gone. Maybe we should only eat fish from dry land fish farms.
maybe we should stop eating fish.
That is quite shocking.
Yeah, we should stop eating anything.
That's one of the most shocking images I've seen for a while.
TreeHugger - please, will you keep us informed of efforts to stop this destruction and let us know who is trying to stop it.
Obviously the massive financial interests of the fishing industry will fight any curtailment of this practice tooth and nail. I think the best path towards mitigating the destruction would be to follow the model that California is exploring right now. Create no dredge zones that allow for large chunks to remain undisturbed and serve as safe havens for recovery in the areas that are damaged. Hopefully the Cali experiment will show marked benefits such as a stabilization of fish population. The idea could be similar to sustainable logging practices.
fish farms feed their fish with wild fish so both are bad
Awful. But there are programs out there for mindful seafood practices. Seafood Watch was started by the Monterey Bay Aquarium (and now followed by others) about fishing practices and our choices as consumers.
http://www.mbayaq.org/cr/seafoodwatch.asp