LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
Oceans at risk
Difficult to face, our oceans are at risk and fish species are diminishing and in delicate, extremely fragile condition.
Landmark papers, monumental in scope by Thor Heyerdahl, “How To Kill An Ocean,”published in 1975, and E. O. Wilson’s “Is Humanity Suicidal,” both men scientific heavyweights outlined serious problems rushing upon us, tsunami in scope. There is no lack of valid scientific studies since then by teams of researchers from numerous countries including American, British, Canadian and Russian.
As outlined in the New York Times in two editorials, one as recent as Sunday, Feb. 16, not a single square foot of ocean has been left untouched by modern society. Polluting run-off from a multiplicity of sources, overfishing, ruthless bottom trawling, social groupings of spawning fish wiped out never to recover all these and more have contributed to the problems of tragically collapsing fish numbers.
I have personally fished in south Florida since 1939 and in the Keys since 1956 and fish declining numbers and ecological destruction have been indescribable and precipitously sliding steeply downhill.
One of the few bright spots has been the rapidly increasing numbers of “marine-protected-areas,” 87 of these off 40 different countries.
They have to be large enough, protected enough and meet other well managed criteria to be effective. This is a tough call here in the Keys, for me and my commercial fisher and sport fisher friends. We are all passionate about our fishing. Large areas have to be off limits and protected or our fish will surely perish as did the cod off New England putting thousands of people out of work.
So far it appears for the foreseeable future. The reality is the Sanctuary people in their planning of “marine preserves” have it mostly correct. We can cooperate and have hope or resist to what end other than eventual decimation of our cherished marine living resources.
Jerry Weinstock
Key West
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I agree, Jerry, this is a tough issue to resolve in a way that does not leave a lot of human casualties. I started fishing the flats around Islamorada in the latter 1950s. It was my favorite thing to do, even though I lived in Alabama. I saw and heard stories of the decline in fish populations. We understood over-fishing was the cause. We saw the conchs and green turtles diminish in numbers. We were not aware of the chemical runoff effect coming out of the Everglades and rivers into the Bay of Florida. The phosphates and nitrogens. I attended a Marine Sanctuary Steering Committee meeting a few weeks ago at the county government center in Marathon, which focused on the pilot program for fixing, or trying to fix, the polluted canals in the Keys. Just a few of the canals, as they don’t have anywhere near the funding to tackle the entire problem, and they are still in the studying, trying to figure out stage. When I told them about the chemical runoff problem coming back around, with respect to that having killed most of the reef many years ago, they did not seem receptive. The lower Florida district head of Department of Environmental Protection chaired the meeting. Understatement. I came away from the meeting not feeling encouraged that the Marine Sanctuary was looking out for Mother Nature first. For a very long time I have not been encouraged that the fishing industry was looking out for Mother Nature first. Perhaps the fishing in the Keys is fated to go the way of the reef. Perhaps the fishing industry is fated to go the way of the salvaging industry, which was so dominant in the Key West economy many years ago. Perhaps the fishing industry is going the way of the dinosaurs. The fish catch photos in the Key West Citizen suggest as much. Years ago, not self-respecting fisherman would have posed photos of such paltry catches.