Category: Fisheries

Living with Sea Otters Next Door

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May 20, 2020 By Brad Badelt Hakai Magazine
Stories about declining species have become all too common. But what about when an animal comes back from the brink? It’s welcome news for conservationists, of course. But the return of a species can also have unexpected consequences. Take the sea otter. By around a century ago, the maritime fur trade had nearly wiped the species out along North America’s west coast. However, with an international treaty and federal statutes banning hunting, and reintroduction programs launched in the 1960s and 1970s, sea otters have since rebounded. They’ve even re-established in some areas where they were once extirpated.

Economists Put a Price Tag on Living Whales in Brazil: $82 Billion

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May 18, 2020 By Elizabeth Claire Alberts Mongabay
Each winter, southern right whales and humpback whales migrate to the waters off Brazil to feed on krill and phytoplankton, and to give birth to their young among the country’s rich coral reefs. These whales attract thousands of tourists, and their money, to Brazil. A whale’s capacity to bring tourist dollars into Brazil, in addition to its ability to regulate the environment and enhance fisheries, is worth a lot, according to a group of economists. Now, they’ve put a figure on it: $82 billion.

Looking More Deeply Into the Past to Gauge the Planet’s Future

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May 18, 2020 By James Dinneen Undark
In 1995, biologist Daniel Pauly made a shrewd observation: Scientists in his field had forgotten about the past. Pauly, who studied commercial fishing at the University of British Columbia, observed that fisheries scientists tended to measure change in the abundance and species composition of the fish stocks they studied relative to what they were like at the beginning of their careers. As fish stocks declined, each new generation of scientists generally accepted the new normal as the natural state of things.

The state of the Arctic Ocean? Unpredictable

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May 15, 2020 By Jimmy Thomson The Narwhal
Transformations of Arctic sea ice are altering the ferocity of storms, the deadliness of polar bears and even the ovulation of ringed seals, according to a new report from Fisheries and Oceans Canada, the State of the Arctic Ocean. The broad, overarching study finds changes in ocean ice are influencing habitat and animals in the country’s North in unpredictable ways. These changes, largely due to climate change, are leaving natural systems in chaos. 

Ocean ‘Breathability’ Key to Past, Future Habitat of West Coast Marine Species

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May 15, 2020 By Hannah Hickey UW News
A new study led by the University of Washington finds that the animals’ ability to breathe in that water may be key to where and when they thrive. The study, published May 15 in Science Advances, uses recent understanding of water breathability and historical data to explain population cycles of the northern anchovy. The results for this key species could apply to other species in the current.