EDFish

The New Sardine: Thinking Outside the Can

By Kristen Honey, EDF Lorry Lokey Fellow 

Are sardines making a sustainable and sumptuous comeback? The Washington Post attempted to address this very question yesterday in a provocative article about the self-proclaimed “Sardinistas.”  According to this group of nutritionists, environmentalists and foodie revolutionaries, the answer is a resounding “yes!”  Sardine advocates and cutting-edge green chefs like Dean Gold and David Myers are bringing this smelly canned food out of the cob-webbed cabinet corner and back into the kitchen in innovative new ways. Or they are trying to, at least.

Just recently, I had the privilege of attending a private luncheon with the Sardinistas at filmmaker Mark Shelley’s Sea Studios Foundation on Monterey’s Cannery Row.  The purpose of this luncheon was to highlight their recent efforts to promote sardines as a delicious and sustainable seafood choice.   What struck me was their point that while Americans love eating tuna and other steak-like fish, we need to eat fish farther down the food chain (like sardines) to help alleviate pressure at the top. 

After talking shop, we had the chance to eat delectable canned, frozen and fresh sardine dishes by renowned chef Alton Brown of The Food Network!  If you don’t take my word for how tasty these creatures can be, try out for yourself these sardine-centric recipes for Sarde Arrosto (Griddle Roasted Sardines), Stuffed Sardines and Vuido (widowed potatoes).

Mike Sutton (Director of Monterey Bay AquariumI was pleased that the group tied in the tastings with a bit of history, noting that Cannery Row was once considered the sardine Mecca of the U.S. in the late 1930s. However, by the 1950s the sardine population was severely depleted due to poor fishery management that didn’t take into account natural ocean cycles. 

The tides have changed (no oceans pun intended) for these cute little guys and today EDF’s Seafood Selector rates Pacific sardines as an “eco-best fish.”  Their re-emergence was no accident; the sardine fishery is now managed in a sustainable way, with fishing quotas at one-tenth of what they were during the 1930s.  So listen to your curious, daring taste-buds and eat some sardines for a change – not only do all those omega-3 fatty acids improve your health, but you are doing a service to the planet.

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Kemp’s Ridley Sea Turtle Rebound: A Short History

By Ryan Ono, Gulf Oceans Program Research and Outreach Associate

Until half a century ago, tens of thousands of Kemp’s ridley sea turtles would surge onto Mexican beaches in a few large nesting events to lay their eggs. (One was estimated having up to 40,000 turtles!)

But, at the turn of the 20th century turtle meat and eggs became popular delicacies, causing large numbers of turtles to be harvested at sea and many eggs to be gathered from beaches. Additionally in the 1940s and 1950s, numerous sea turtles were caught in the nets of the rapidly expanding shrimp fishery.

[kml_flashembed movie="http://www.youtube.com/v/mmNdn0hYLZM" width="250" height="207" align="right" wmode="transparent" /]

These pressures caused the Kemp’s ridley population to crash – almost to the point of extinction, when nesting events would number only one or two thousand turtles.

In the 1960s and 1970s, joint U.S.-Mexican efforts to revive turtle populations re-established a secondary nesting site in the U.S. to protect the eggs from poaching and damage caused by humans.  Hatchery and “head-start” programs were also started. The head-start program raised turtles for a few years until they were big enough to be released into the wild – about the size of a dinner plate.

In the 1990s, EDF’s Michael Bean and Pam Baker helped the recovery effort by fighting for gear modifications to all shrimping boats called turtle excluder devices, or “TEDs,” which reduced the number of turtles caught.  They also worked for shrimping closures off the Texas coast during nesting seasons.

As recently as eight years ago the number of endangered Kemp’s Ridley turtle nests found on Texas shores numbered fewer than ten.  Since 2004 however, there have been consecutive record breaking years and in 2008 a total of 195 Kemp’s Ridley turtle nests were found. 

This year’s total stands currently at 154 nests and is on track to surpass last year’s number, with two months of the season left to go.  Check back at the end of the summer for an update! 

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Pound Net Fishing on the Scuppernong River, North Carolina

EDF mostly works on ocean fisheries, but we took some time out a few months ago to meet with Willy Phillips from Columbia, North Carolina to see how he fishes using pound nets on the Scuppernong River. Willy owns Full Circle Crab Company, Inc. and he also fishes for yellow perch, shad and other fish that mostly come to the river after spending part of their life in the ocean.

Pound nets are an ancient fishing method. They’re basically fish traps: fish swim in but can’t swim out. Fishermen simply pull the nets up and harvest the fish. There’s virtually no bycatch or waste because unwanted fish are thrown back unharmed into the river.

Here are two video clips of my trip out on the river with Willy. I was on a rocking boat surrounded by flopping fish and working fishermen who were very gracious to this city boy.

VIDEO 1: This is the start of the pound net fishing process. The fishermen pull the nets up until the fish are close to the surface where upon they can be scooped up with smaller nets.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7-QtQaJA0Kw

VIDEO 2: As you can see, the nets are loaded with fish. The herring fishery is closed in North Carolina and herring constitutes most of the fish you see here that are being thrown back into the river.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rEBl9StVXfw

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Talkin’ Catch Shares on the Texas Coast

By Marcie Jones, Gulf of Mexico Program Coordinator, Environmental Defense Fund Oceans Program

I recently attended Corpus Christi’s 10th Annual Earth Day – Bay Day Festival on behalf of EDF’s Gulf of Mexico Oceans program.  I’d heard about the festival since I started at EDF last year, so I was really excited to share our catch share message with the 10,000+ attendees.

This annual event is hosted by The Coastal Bend Bays Foundation so that locals can learn about bays, estuaries, wetlands, native plants and animals, recycling and general conservation and environmental issues. 

Our booth was full of information, facts and photos that showcased the problems with fisheries, explained why people should care, and described how catch shares can help. I met many interesting people, from age 5 to 85, asking about our work, commenting on the booth photos and picking up information such as our Oceans of Abundance report.

By the end of the day, I’d talked with hundreds about our work and had lots of ideas to improve the booth for next year.

Cool tidbit: At the beginning of the festival the Gulf Coast Indian Confederation blessed the grounds with a drum circle ceremony.

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Captain Bill Kelly’s Radio Show, Live from the Florida Keys

Michelle Owen, EDF Recreational Fisheries SpecialistMichelle Owen, EDF’s Recreational Fisheries Specialist, shares her first experience appearing on the Captain Bill Kelly Friday Night Radio Show in the Florida Keys.

What was scheduled as a 30 minute meeting on April 17th with Captain Bill Kelly turned into 90 minutes as he persuaded me to be a guest on his Friday night radio show.  The show is great community radio  broadcasted live every Friday night from Wahoo’s Bar and Restaurant at the Whale Harbor Marina in Islamorada.  Yes, my meeting was scheduled in a bar, it’s the Keys! And it’s the perfect spot for a productive meeting – a great view of the charterboat fishing fleet, fresh fish and a great crowd. Not too surprising that a fishing show packs the bar every Friday night. 

Michelle Owen with Captain Bill Kelly, and Rob Clift of the National Parks Conservation Association, during the Captain Bill Kelly Friday Night Radio Show live from the Florida Keys.It was my first time on the radio and Capt. Kelly and his co-host did an excellent job keeping it easy and fun. Capt. Kelly introduced me to his listening audience and encouraged recreational fisherman in the Keys to contact me to learn more about EDF’s fisheries work. 

I have a standing invitation to come back for a more lengthy topical conversation and I plan on taking him up on that offer sooner rather than later.   Though I can’t promise a view, I’ll let you know when you should fire up the grill, pour a cold drink and listen live via internet to EDF talk fish on the “Friday Night Radio Show”. 

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Recovering from Hurricane Ike in the Gulf of Mexico

Fishermen under IFQs were able to keep their businesses going after Hurricane Ike.Eight months after Hurricane Ike slammed Texas’ largest fishing community, Galveston is steadily recovering from the storm. Red snapper fishermen under IFQ management kept their businesses going because they could fish later in the year and lease quota to others when they couldn’t fish themselves. Read more.

Destroyed Kemp’s ridley turtle habitat
Endangered Kemp’s ridley sea turtles have shown a strong come-back in recent years.  Unfortunately, Hurricane Ike damaged and piled debris on their South Padre Island nesting beaches. Volunteers worked to restore and clean up the sites before the turtles’ nesting season, which began last month. Experts are hopeful that these efforts will help Kemp’s ridleys keep recovering. Read more.

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