No fish Left in the Ocean by 2048!!! – Media hype gets you more citations? Well, it did for this fisheries paper. By Dr Bik
Media hype gets you more citations? Well, it did for this fisheries paper. Y’all might remember the slight media coverage (ha!) of a very controversial fisheries paper published in 2006: “Impacts of biodiversity loss on ecosystem services” by Boris Worm and others, Trevor Branch, having long been captivated by fisheries research and having deep knowledge of this Worm et al. controversy, sat back in his chair, pented his fingers, and had an epiphany: “I’ve got it! We should analyze citation patterns for Worm et al. (2006)!” (a written dramatization of possibly real events). So he did. And the results are pretty awesome. continue!
Too bad these nuts didn’t pick some other industry to ruin with their junk science
It gets better, Phil.
“Tears streamed down my 7-year-old daughter’s face this cloudy, March morning, as we watched the plight of a lone female California sea lion pup, clearly exhausted, struggling to keep her head above water and get herself to our local beach’s jetty.”
This sea lion was not the strong, plump and playful sort we had seen in years past. She was so small, kept going under, then her head would barely rise above the water.
We gasped as the pup used the last of her strength to slowly hoist herself onto the jetty, right before another wave came. She made it. We saw her heave a sigh as she collapsed onto a large rock, safe from the water below.
She tried, but could not lift her head, and just laid still and panting. Her bones jutted out, every vertebra and her pelvis visible underneath her brown fur. She looked too young to be without a mother, and she was clearly malnourished.
Get ready.
Unfortunately, this struggling sea lion is not alone in this heartbreaking condition, which is part of why my own tears came along with my daughter’s.
The Bigger Picture
But here’s the thing: This isn’t just a local issue, and it isn’t just about this specific group of sea lions’ food supply.
Something is going on with all marine mammals’ food supply. Something major is happening with all of our ocean ecosystems. These malnourished pups are just the tip of the proverbial iceberg.
Dr. Bruce Monger, an oceanographer at Cornell University, told my class in eCornell’s Plant-Based Nutrition Certificate Program that we as a society have “maxed out the ocean.”
He says 75 percent of all major fisheries in the world are currently either fully exploited or over-exploited, and we have less than 10 percent of the top ocean predators (e.g., swordfish or bluefin tuna) today than we had in the 1960s. These fish aren’t replaceable, friends.
Many marine scientists believe that, at the rate we’re going, the seas will be barren by 2048. (Did you get that? No sea life in 35 years!)
Wow!
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/megan-pincus-kajitani/want-to-save-starving-sea_b_2897651.html?utm_hp_ref=fb&src=sp&comm_ref=false