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California cancels salmon fishing season

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Re: California cancels salmon fishing season

#131
post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a classic Tragedy Of The Commons. Establish ownable fishing rights per ocean areas, and regular greed will solve this problem.

I will happily cover my land in radioactive sludge today [1], in exchange for a one-time payoff that exceeds what I paid for it (Or, worse yet, what I can expect to recoup from it in ). Also, it's not like fish are going to respect lot borders. Overfishing in the lot next to mine will damage my lot's value. The only correct way for me to respond is by overfishing my lot. [1] And leave my neighbours to deal with the l…

The empirical experience is that landowners take good long term care of their land. That is how it keeps its value.

You may be disappointed to learn that lucrative radioactive sludge cover opportunities are quite hard to find in today's market.

You're right the fishing right zones need to account for fish migration paths etc.

Re: California cancels salmon fishing season

#132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Studies estimate that up to 40% of all marine life caught is thrown overboard as bycatch. This is a fairly important part. It’s one thing to fish and eat. It’s another thing to fish and destroy. Trawling is the strip mining of the sea.

In the US, you are required to discard bycatch under penalty of law. As a professional fisherman you aren't even allowed to eat it. They don't want to discard it, they are required to. The regulation nominally exists to disincentivize bycatch but anecdotally it seems to just ensure that bycatch becomes waste.

It would be better to ban the type of fishing that produces enormous bycatch and also destroy the seabed.

Re: California cancels salmon fishing season

#133
post #15

It's not just the draughts. https://www.seaspiracy.org/facts "Species like thresher, bull and hammerhead sharks have lost up to 80-99% of their populations in the last two decades. Seabird populations have declined by 70% since the 1950's. Studies estimate that up to 40% of all marine life caught is thrown overboard as bycatch. Six out of seven species of sea turtles are either threatened or endangered due to fishing…

> 2.7 trillion fish are caught every year, or up to 5 million caught every minute.

Bycatch aside, this number absolutely floors me. There is no way this number can sound remotely sustainable to anyone, right?

I love seafood, but I know the issues with overfishing so I don't eat it often and when I do, I do my best to only eat sustainably caught or farmed fish...but I feel absolutely hopeless seeing numbers like this.

Re: California cancels salmon fishing season

#134
post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wealthy people in developed countries won’t change. They either don’t want to inconvenience themselves or acknowledge that they’re the problem - or both. People will instead say nonsense like, “corporations are the problem.” I think it’s great that you’re taking steps to reduce your impact on the world (I’ve made many myself: no meat, no kids, no driving, no flying, small dense housing), but honestly don’t get your h…

Wealthy people's habits may be the problem, but its important to understand that putting the blame on individuals' choices is a trap and distraction. The solution is regulation. Heavy, obtrusive, expensive regulation, which is required because as you say most people won't change.

> Heavy, obtrusive, expensive regulation, which is required because as you say most people won't change.

People will just vote it down. And not just the rich; the middle classes, the working classes, practically anyone who stands to lose even a few dollars or a few luxuries. People will only accept regulations that don’t affect themselves.

Re: California cancels salmon fishing season

#135
post #86
post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They're not fallacies, they're fundamental disagreements. 1. No, animals do not have rights. 2. No, animal lives are not morally equal to human lives. 3. No, eating animals is not cruel. If you disagree with these then that's fine, we can have a discussion about that, but you have to understand that not everyone agrees with you on these points otherwise you'll become that annoying vegan that pushes their beliefs on e…

Let's ;) > No, animals do not have rights. What about pets? Let's talk about dairy industry ... why don't we switch to dog milk? Nothing wrong with dog's milk. Full of goodness, full of vitamins, full of marrowbone jelly. Lasts longer than any other milk, dog's milk. Why? No bugger'll drink it. Plus of course the advantage of dog's milk is that when it goes off, it tastes exactly the same as when it's fresh. > No, an…

We drink dairy milk because our culture has evolved along with dairy cows themselves. Maybe in an alternate timeline we'd be milking dogs. The cultural connection is why people are so attached to their meat (me included).

As a member of an older school farming community, livestock make natural fertilizer and meat from grass, bugs, and surplus grain. They play an important role in completing the nutrient cycle. Meat ends up being a bit of a luxury (limited quantities), but it's a product of sustainable land use imo

Re: California cancels salmon fishing season

#136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is different than fish, as tungsten is recyclable and doesn't rot. Read up on the Simon/Ehrlich wager. Nobody knows the future, but your professor was demonstrating a solid economic principle.

I know that oil and tungsten are materially different from fish. Marginal costs of digging things out of the ground does in fact tend to increase gradually with scarcity, as do incentives to devote resources to basic research into recycling, consumption reduction, and alternatives. But teaching undergrads about tungsten and not fish is just propaganda. Edit: To be clear, the point is not that my professor was idiotic…

Oil and gas are different than metals though because some deposits spurt out of the ground, while others require heroic drilling, pumping and refining efforts that take more energy to realize. This is the concept of energy returned on energy invested (EROEI). When it takes more energy to get the oil out of the ground than is in the oil, it might be better to use the energy for something else and leave the oil in the ground.

Re: California cancels salmon fishing season

#137
post #85
post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Cancel all commercial fishing

I would love to see all commercial fishing banned as well for something like 10 years. Unfortunately there are other countries that would not respect the ban and even if not countries, individuals would ignore it as it would create a black market. I still think the idea should be discussed and maybe g20 nations come up with some agreements. Hopefully things like lab grown fish improve and maybe we can move people awa…

I'm unclear why you'd stop at commercial fishing . Just ban all fishing and all fish consumption. The premise that your children could one day eat fish is the problem

Re: California cancels salmon fishing season

#138
post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I will happily cover my land in radioactive sludge today [1], in exchange for a one-time payoff that exceeds what I paid for it (Or, worse yet, what I can expect to recoup from it in ). Also, it's not like fish are going to respect lot borders. Overfishing in the lot next to mine will damage my lot's value. The only correct way for me to respond is by overfishing my lot. [1] And leave my neighbours to deal with the l…

The empirical experience is that landowners take good long term care of their land. That is how it keeps its value. You may be disappointed to learn that lucrative radioactive sludge cover opportunities are quite hard to find in today's market. You're right the fishing right zones need to account for fish migration paths etc.

Where are you from? I'd like to move if people around you take care of their land. Here in Michigan people don't often do that.

My private well is contaminated with 85 ppt (and my bloodstream, at 30ppt years after fixing the water supply) of PFAS because Wolverine tannery owners decided to dump ScotchGuard contaminated scraps in the swamp behind their homes.

The river through that same town, likewise, is no longer a world-class trout stream because homeowners on the stream banks fill it with nitrates and algae blooms by fertilizing their lawns. Lakes are clogged with zebra mussels because fishermen won't clean their boats and drain livewells/bilges while traveling between lakes, and the very fish they're going around to catch are down precipitously as a result of those actions. Once-productive farms? Soil's depleted. Old growth forests? Clear-cut, replaced by scrubby tangles and immature pines. The whole Great Lakes ecosystems? I give it less than a decade before invasive carp come through Chicago's unreliable electric deterrent.

The lack of radioactive sludge opportunities is unique, most other land-destroying activities are well established.

Land keeps its value because it's scarce and the growing population and growing economy keeps needing it, not because it's maintained to anything remotely like the ecological quality it once had.

Re: California cancels salmon fishing season

#139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Studies estimate that up to 40% of all marine life caught is thrown overboard as bycatch. This is a fairly important part. It’s one thing to fish and eat. It’s another thing to fish and destroy. Trawling is the strip mining of the sea.

In the US, you are required to discard bycatch under penalty of law. As a professional fisherman you aren't even allowed to eat it. They don't want to discard it, they are required to. The regulation nominally exists to disincentivize bycatch but anecdotally it seems to just ensure that bycatch becomes waste.

If you're allowed to keep bycatch, then the incentive to reduce it is suddenly gone - easier to just find a way to accidentally also make money off it.

Re: California cancels salmon fishing season

#140
post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There was a bombshell report about an immediate moratorium on crab fishing in Alaska, that came out of nowhere, seemingly. About a month later there was a (very, very quiet) report justifying the moratorium. The short version is that effectively scientists had been asking for reduction in fishing in the area for decades and finally the remaining stock in the area was so low it was critically endangering the ecosystem…

You had me until the last sentence: Anglers have an enormous impact on fish and wildlife stocks. In English, the term "anglers" generally means hobby fishers -- hook and line, if you like. Are you saying that individuals have an enormous impact? I doubt it. I tried to Google about it, but I find nothing. The damage is mostly caused by industrial fishing and global warming.

I'm saying I'm refuting his statement, and using his language and wording to add impact and tie my post to his.
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