The future of the fishing industry rests
in our hands and not many people know that
Fishing for some people is a hobby,
others a competitive sport, and for a few it’s an obsession. But what people
don’t know is that the fish we all love to catch need our help every now and
again. In this day and age it seems like some aren’t getting the attention they
need.
A species
that is rising in both population and media attention is the Asian carp. For
people who don’t know, the Asian carp was put into farm ponds down south to
clean algae. But when the areas flooded the carp accidentally got into
tributaries off the Mississippi river . This
happened back in the late 1990’s. Now the carp are traveling up the river and
are headed to the great lakes. If the carp are not stopped from reaching the
great lakes it could cause horrific damages to the entire great lakes region. A
major concern is the bass populations on Lake St. Clair .
The fishing there is considered world class and if the carp reach that point
they could easily wipe out the bass. They is currently an on going fight to
stop these monsters. There has been electric fences put up to scare the carp
down but it doesn’t seem to be 100% effective. What you, the average person can
do is get it out there that this is happening and what the consequences for
this if it is not stopped. Our commercial fishing industry would be wiped out
and we wouldn’t have any of our game fish like before. (Asian Carp)
A lesser
known idea that is spreading slowly is the idea of banning or stopping there
from being a size limit in order to keep a fish. Let’s say people only take the
big fish from the lake or pond. This is going to make the fish adapt to that
and spawn at an earlier age and size so they can pass there genes down before
they die. So the average fish size lets say… 20 years down the road will be
smaller than before because of this. There have also been experiments done on
this. For example,
“In
one lab experiment, scientists harvested 90% of the fish from each of 6
populations. Only the largest fish were taken from two populations; only the
smallest from another two populations; and in the final two fish were taken at
random. After only four generations, fish in the populations that had lost all
their big fish were only about one-third the average weight of those in the
random-catch group.” (Fishing
Size Limits)
The way we could combat this is to ban the size limit and
take out an equal number of fish ranging in all sizes so we have a steady
population of bigger fish like bass and walleye in the future. This would also
help because the bigger the fish is the more eggs the fish lays come spawning
time. So if we take out the big fish we are taking out the main breeder fish in
the population.
Overall the future of the fishing industry is a tough topic
to talk about. There is a lot involved in it and not one person or group can do
everything. So we have to play our part and try to ensure a future for our
beloved sport. Doing even one of these ideas above can really help out.
Works Cited
"DNR - Asian Carp Fact Sheet." DNR - Asian Carp Fact Sheet.
N.p., n.d. Web. 02 May 2014.
<http://www.michigan.gov/dnr/0%2C4570%2C7-153-10364_52261_54896-232231--%2C00.html>.
"Asian Carp Regional Coordinating
Committee." AsianCarp.us.
N.p., n.d. Web. 02 May 2014. <http://www.asiancarp.us/>.
"Fishing Size Limits: How Fish Are
Gaming the System." Environmental
Defense Fund. N.p., n.d. Web. 02 May 2014.
<http://www.edf.org/blog/2013/04/25/fishing-size-limits-how-fish-are-gaming-system>.
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