Mote Marine Laboratory

What’s the Catch?

By: Donna Self

What would a dinner menu in Florida be without grouper, shrimp or conch? It might just be healthier for the environment.

So say new guidelines in the Southeast Seafood Guide promoted by Monterey Bay Aquarium’s Seafood Watch program. The guidelines, which list the best seafood choices for consumers in the Southeast, were created after scientists and industry representatives from Florida to Texas gathered for a brainstorming session at Mote. Educators at the two-day session also discussed the best way to tell the public about the new guidelines.

Seafood Watch started in 1999 as part of the Sustainable Seafood movement, which encourages better fish harvesting and farming methods to save depleted populations and to prevent ecosystem damage. The program offers pocket-sized guides, or cards, for consumers that categorize seafood under “best choices,” “proceed with caution” or “avoid.” In addition to the Southeast card, there are national and West Coast cards.

The Monterey Bay Aquarium in California, the Environmental Defense Fund in Washington and the Blue Ocean Institute in New York have been developing the cards since 1999. The Southeast card was released in the spring after the 2004 Gulf Regional Workshop at Mote.

“Every single species on the card has a 20 to 50 page report behind it that maps out what we know of the species, the fisheries that provide them to the public, and the population numbers,” says Robert Mazurek, Fisheries Research Biologist at Monterey Bay Aquarium. “But it all just winds up as one line on the card.”

Assessments were based upon vulnerability of the species, the status of the stock and the by-catch that goes along with certain methods of harvest, Mazurek said. Two harvest methods are considered problematic to the environment: net fishing and long-line fishing. Net fishing, or trawling, can destroy fish habitats on the ocean floor, including coral reefs that take centuries to grow back. By-catch, or unintended and useless catch, happens when fish are caught in nets or on one of the thousands of baited long-line hooks that can be stretched over an area from 1 to 4 miles long.

“Globally, by-catch makes up about one-fourth of the total catch,” Mazurek says, “and most of it is thrown overboard dead or dying.”

Dr. Kevan Main, director of Mote’s Center for Aquaculture Research and Development, advises consumers to find out exactly where their fish came from, whether they’re buying from a local grocery or are having dinner at a restaurant. “The more consumers demand to know, the more suppliers will have to come up with the information,” she says.

Mote is distributing the Southeast Seafood Guides to aquarium visitors and through its mobile exhibits, says Julie Childers, director of Mote’s School and Public Education Programs. “It’s not effective to tell people that they can’t do something,” she says. “It’s much better to give them a choice.”

Childers says the card itself is a teaching tool to create public awareness, not a solution to saving depleted fish stocks.

“The important thing is that people are thinking about it,” she says. “If people don’t make the best environmentally friendly choice every day, maybe they’ll make it every other day. Every little bit helps.”

Download a Seafood Guide at www.mbayaq.org/cr/seafoodwatch.asp or pick one up at Mote Aquarium.

Learn more about: Aquaculture