Monster warning to protect oceans (BBC/Viewpoint) {overfishing}

[eppur_se_muova]

VIEWPOINT
Mark Norman

The landing of a colossal squid by New Zealand fishermen earlier this year offered a rare glimpse into the mysterious world deep beneath the waves. Scientist Mark Norman uses this week's Green Room to argue that it also shows how marine life is being destroyed before it is understood.
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The largest single invertebrate animal ever found was recently captured by longline fishermen in Antarctic seas. Known as a colossal squid, it weighed 450kg (990lb), about twice the weight of the largest squid previously captured.

This event highlights two points; firstly, that our knowledge of the most common habitat on our planet - the deep sea - is still in its infancy, and secondly that such scientific discoveries indicate the scale and reach of global fisheries exploitation.
***
Throughout the world, longlining for fish has come at a high cost. Not only the fish themselves but also the countless albatross, other seabirds and marine mammals, attracted to and drowned on these baited lines.
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This strip-mining of the deep ocean has gone largely unnoticed, aided by consumers who really don't want to know that their Chilean sea bass, sea perch or trevalla have come courtesy of the clearance of deep-sea coral forests or drowned albatrosses.
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more: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/6549161.stm

[Blue_In_AK]

1. That's a lot of calimari. n/t

[flvegan]

2. Folks might want to consider not eating seafood anymore.

Just sayin'.

[Delphinus]

3. His final paragraph puts it all into

perspective:
"... but a larger part of me saw it as yet another casualty of our short-sighted wanton plundering of the deep ocean."

Everything we do is short-sighted! What's wrong with us?!

[GliderGuider]

4. What's wrong with us?

We didn't evolve the mental tools we needed to cope responsibly with the capabilities of our clever monkey brains.

And then we developed totalitarian agriculture. That development gave us a skewed outlook on the world and our place in it. I'm quite taken by Daniel Quinn's explanation of this aspect of our culture. Basically we think the world holds only two classes of things -- humans and resources.

[Dead_Parrot]

7. We're Stupid.

We're so stupid, you even had to ask...

:P

[Javaman]

5. "oh no!! Godzilla!!" nt

[reggie the dog]

6. perhaps those old stories

about monsters eating ships from back in the 1600's have some base in truth.