On a blistering and humid day in a suburb on the outskirts of Jakarta, Indonesia, small wooden fishing boats glide into port, their hulls full of fish or shellfish. Despite deep tans, some of the fishermen protect their faces from the sun by wearing cotton "ski masks" soaked in water. Squint against the horizon and you can make out the wooden corrals that mark their village's fishing territory.
After the boats tie up, fishermen squat on a concrete quay to sort shellfish--a species of small periwinkle--one by one into sacks. Others pack two-foot-long flat silvery fish in ice into large 55-gallon plastic drums. The fishermen worry about pirates who rob their village shellfishing grounds. Some worry about the supply of fish in their fishery.
The fishermen of Jakarta are not alone in their worry about the fish supply. Every year fishing fleets trawl farther and farther from home. Large fleets roam halfway around the world to compete with fishermen from other countries who are already fishing on the outskirts of their own once-abundant fisheries. The more depeleted the fisheries become, the more the large fleets apply new technology, called mobile gear, for an edge in their quest for tonnage. Today's deep sea trawls, "scoop up everything in their path, bringing to the surface whatever doesn't sift through their nets," writes Janet Raloff of Science News. "The catch has fallen in all but 2 of the world's 15 major marine fishing regions; in 4 of them, it has shrunk by more than 30 percent," writes Peter Weber in Protecting Oceanic Fisheries and Jobs on the Web.
Along the North American coasts, according to the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), "Swordfish, red snapper, Atlantic cod and shrimp from the Gulf of Mexico are disappearing from the oceans at a rate faster than they can be replaced." NRDC goes on to warn that black sea bass and Atlantic sea scallops are in danger and that sturgeon could become extinct. Recent media coverage warns that sharks are being overfished and grouper are reportedly dwindling.
Lobsters also are taking a big hit on the Northeast Coast. According to Tracey I. Crago, of Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute Sea Grant, writing in the Sea Grant magazine NOR'EASTER, some fishermen illegally catch egg-bearing females. To disguise their illegal catch from the authorities, they dip the lobsters in chlorine bleach to wash away the eggs, which are carried on the outside of the lobster. By taking the large females, these unscrupulous fishermen deplete the fishery of its breeding population.
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