Twenty years ago, as I swam off the Maui shoreline, I'd see plentiful schools of parrot fish. Called 'uhu by those of us who like them best stuffed with mayonnaise and crab, these popular fish used to be a staple at backyard barbecues.
Now they've disappeared.
Turns out fish are disappearing everywhere.
Fishoutofwater has a good article on the role of warming and acidification in this process.
Even more immediate and alarming is the effect of Purse Seine fishing (dragging nets and scooping up everything)
International Scientific Committee for Tuna and Tuna-like Species in the North Pacific Ocean, ISC, states, "The current (2010) Pacific bluefin biomass level is near historically low levels and experiencing high exploitation rates above all biological reference points commonly used by fisheries managers." and says levels are down by a horrifying 96%. That was three years ago.
What they don't assess is all the other fish that are being scooped up and killed by the purse seine tuna fishing trawlers.
In "The Ocean is Broken" author and sailer, Ivan Macfadyen, talks about the spooky absence of fish on his latest Pacific voyage and coming across one of these seine factory fishing trawlers:
[They] saw a big fishing boat working a reef in the distance.
"All day it was there, trawling back and forth. It was a big ship, like a mother-ship," he said.
And all night it worked too, under bright floodlights. And in the morning Macfadyen was awoken by his crewman calling out, urgently, that the ship had launched a speedboat....
...The speedboat came alongside and the Melanesian men aboard offered gifts of fruit and jars of jam and preserves.
"And they gave us five big sugar-bags full of fish," he said.
"They were good, big fish, of all kinds. Some were fresh, but others had obviously been in the sun for a while.
"We told them there was no way we could possibly use all those fish. There were just two of us, with no real place to store or keep them. They just shrugged and told us to tip them overboard. That's what they would have done with them anyway, they said.
"They told us that his was just a small fraction of one day's by-catch. That they were only interested in tuna and to them, everything else was rubbish. It was all killed, all dumped. They just trawled that reef day and night and stripped it of every living thing."
Tuna makers such as Bumble Bee were
boycotted because their giant nets were drowning dolphins. But it has gone far, far beyond that. These drag boats are
killing everything.
Who is blocking regulations? Could it possibly be someone from a fishing state whose citizens are alarmed there are no fish?
Which brings us to the Hawai'i Senate race (you knew we'd be back to this, didn't you?)
On August 13, 2013 Colleen Hanabusa attended a Seine Fishing event hosted by Bumble Bee Foods, Wespac and other corporations making their money of purse seine fishing.
It was a lucrative appearance for her. Hanabusa's report doesn't group the donors from this event, but based on the dates of contributions, the location of the donors, and the description of their employers, these are the contributions likely related to this event:
1. Brian Hallman ($250)(American Tunaboat Association)--p. 12
2. Michael McGowan ($1,000)(Bumble Bee)--p. 20
3. Jeanette Finete ($250)(C&F Fishing)--p. 43
4. Peter Lin Cheng ($2,500)(South Pacific Tuna Corp.)--p. 53
5. Robert Virissimo ($500)(South Pacific Tuna Corp.)--p. 59
6. Teresa DeSilva ($500)--p. 63
7. Christopher Lischewski ($500)(Bumble Bee)--p. 81
8. Ernest Doizaki ($1,000)(American Fish & Seafood)--p. 96
9. Annette Schlife ($500)--p. 103
10. Margie Newman ($1,000 + $922 for event costs)(Intesa Communications)(pp. 103 & 110)
11. Pike Associates ($2,000)(Jeff Pike lobbyist for Bumble Bee)--(p. 140)
12. Stuart Chikami ($1,000)(Western Pacific Fisheries)--p. 151
13. Daniel Hof, Sr. ($250)(Pacific Ocean Marine Insurance Broker)--p. 154
14. J. Douglas Hinges ($1,000)(Bumble Bee)--p. 165
15. Carole Chikami ($1,000)(Western Pacific Fisheries)--p. 167
16. Bumble Bee PAC ($2,000)--p. 170
Sigh...We don't mind boycotting Colleen Hanabusa since we far prefer progressive, Sen. Brian Schatz in the Hawai'i senate race.
But tuna? But..... Poki (chopped, seasoned raw tuna) is Hawaii's most popular local food.
Has to be done if we want any fish left in the sea.
6:12 PM PT: What did Hanabusa promise the seine fisherman to get all this loot?