Eco Friendly House And Garden

Does restricting the number of certain threatened fish from being brought to land help them?

By making a fixed level for fishing fleets to ‘land’ and sell certain fish was implemented with the intention of making sure that over-fishing at peak breeding times, migration overload, and where numbers we low was restricted.

This, in theory, means that where fish are threatened most (i.e; where over-fishing could irreversibly damage the breeding population as a whole) there are restrictions in place to stop fishermen from expoliting them when they are at their most vulnerable.

However, it doesn’t quite work out like that.

It’s All In The Small Print:
The first problem is that fishing quotas are only applicable when the fish are taken ashore to be weighed and cold, so that officials at the ports can tell who has caught what fish, where and when.

Secondly, fishing nets are not species specific – they aren’t even fish specific – and most fish, mammals and crustaceans die trapped in nets waiting for the fishermen to collect them.

So; if you have gone over your ‘landable’ cod quotas, but just happen to have found 100 dead cod trapped in your nets – what are you going to do with them?

Option 1: Take them back to shore and risk a huge fine?
Option 2: Stay at sea until you have eaten them all?
Option 3: Throw them overboard, dead?

I’m afraid the answer is Option 3. All these dead fish that were accidently caught in nets are wasted needlessly – ironically caught in this ‘quota’ trap.

So What Is The Answer?
Unfortunately, this isn’t an easy one. Allowing ‘already dead, by-product’ cod to be taken ashore rather than wasted would be a sneaky loophole that fishermen could use to go out and just catch cod anyway.

However, allowing them to be killed anyway and just thrown away is the very anti-thesis of setting up the quotas anyway – I mean what good are dead fish at creating a sustainable fishery?

It is very easy when you hear some good news; “we are putting a limit on the number of certain endangered fish from being used for human food” to somehow allow it to be translated in our heads as: “fisherman can’t catch too much of threatened fish species”.

We failed to think of all the others things that this statement means: It means that fishermen will still be overfishing other fish not in the quota; it also doesn’t change the fact that we already ‘accidently’ catch and kill dozens of other aqautic species that are not financially viable to take to shore (boats are only so big); and it doesn’t even mention what would happen to any of the fish they caught if they have reached that quota?

But, thankfully, someone has. Someone (who luckily happened to be the very famous and very influential Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall) has now made this needless waste of threatened fish and other marine life public, and even has a campaign in place to help us all do something about it!

Visit his well chosen website: www.fishfight.net, join the likes of Stephen Fry and Richard Branson, and do you part for the fish!

You can also watch his recent documentary on this topic – and get some really great tips on sustainable shopping too!

photo credit: derekkeats

A Story of what Man leaves behind, he says……

It wasn’t about eco friendly anything really – however, it covers some very interesting points.

Yes, it covered how all our impact in most areas would cease for the better immediately – zero carbon emissions, no more deforestation or over fishing etc, but it also highlighted what would happen to the things that we need to manage – like nuclear power plants, dams, exotic species, farm animals and pets!

If we don’t keep working with these – they will go astray, and can’t work or survive on their own!

I was gripped throughout the book (although it’s not a read cover to cover in one go type of book), not just by it’s attention to detail regarding individual people and actions – but by the wealth of natural forests and habitats that I never knew existed and now want to learn more about!

The Book Itself:
We have created so many things that are durable that they won’t be going anywhere fast!  And infact some could threaten the very planet after we are gone!

The book assumes that humans literally vanish in a second and leave the world right as it is in that instant., so factories still running, shops still open, communities still farming – then we go.

The author – Alan Weisman doesn’t even entertain for a minute that there will be any surviving humans, and even if there were – it wouldn’t be anything like the BBC drama Survivors.

There are things out there that just can’t be controlled without the skilled people who work with them now.  Yes, the electricity and water stopped and the stores closed – but what about that nuclear reactor still burning away?  What about oil pumps sucking out millions of gallons or flammable and toxic oil above the surface?

And all the plastic we have ever made is still out there – it never goes away – it’s just getting smaller and smaller. So if it’s a bag for example floating in the sea, it get eaten by a turtle (aling with other plastics and so the turtle dies; however when the turtle has decomposed or been eaten, the bag becomes released again. Then the bag is in smaller bits floating on the sea so it gets eaten by and kills an albatros, who then dies – and then when they get eaten, the bag bits come out again, and gets smaller. Then it gets eaten again and again and again through the food chain – forever it would seem!

He tells us that there are patches of woodland dotted around the world that are so old that they defies everything we now know about woodland management. 

One on the Polish-Belarus border hasn’t been affected by humans since the dawn of time – literally.  It is called the Bialowieza Puszcza and means ‘forest primeval’.  There are a whole host of ancient – and giant – species of trees a whole host of rare and unusual native European mammals including the lynx, wolf, bear and even the wisent – a European bison!

There is also an ancient forest right in the heart of the Bronx, New York.  There is a patch of historic woodland that was there when the first Europeans came over to the state – and there is stays!  The rest of New York has been deforested and flattened while this pocket of history goes on!

Result: 4/5
It’s a really good place to start if you are trying to think of a reason to reduce your waste (big section on plastics), change your habits (farming and food waste) and cut your energy uses (power sources).

Basically, it can make you think hard and fast about what we are doing to the very planet we depend on, whether we are here or not!

After reading this book, you need to look at the trail of every item you hold in your hand that day, whether it’s food, an electrical item or clothing and ask yourself the following questions:

• Where was it from, and what did it take to make it and get it here?
• What does it actually do to improve your life (if at all) and why do I need this exact thing over the alternatives?
• And, where does it go after it leaves my hand?  And is that a good place????????

So, go out to the book store or library at read this book!

ISBN: 978-0-7535-1357-6