The NRDC has updated their sustainable seafood guide.
And we pretty much need to kiss tuna goodbye for a decade or two or our grandchildren will never know the taste.
Comments
Didn’t I just ask you about tuna being sustainable? Or do you mean tuna steaks?
That was government data. This is NRDC data updated this week. There’s a discrepancy between them.
And I thought voting for Obama was voting for change.
He’s got four years and I can’t imagine it’s a priority, but still. If he doesn’t do something about the fishing situation, both in terms of the health concerns of farmed fish and the overfishing of wild fish, I’m going to be very disappointed.
… I was only kidding.
ooh ooh… maybe someone will chime in about how preserved canned tuna smells like cat food
Looking at all the other problems we face these days, I can deal without eating tuna.
I know you’re not that simple, Evan. When Species disappear, ecologies fall out of balance. When ecologies fall out of balance, it gets harder for US to survive. It’s basic math. This isn’t just whining over the luxury of good sushi. It’s the welfare of the single largest support of life on earth: the ocean. The loss of one of its most prolific predators throws things dramatically out of balance.
I hope you like jelly fish. I can tell you, they taste like cold sesame noodles. Not too good. But it might be all that’s left by the time you’re on the way out.
Oh, but it is that simple. They’ll never be hunted to total extinction, that would be ridiculous. They’ll merely be hunted to near extinction, which may cause a calamity, or it may be like when blue whales, humpback whales, buffalo, mountain gorillas, california condors, or any other large animals near or at the top of the food chain nearly disappear. People will be like “OH shit! Where they go?!” and then freak out, and extreme measures will be taken, and the species will embark on a slow path towards rebuilding their population, and we’ll all forget about it and worry about the next delicious animal we’ve almost eaten off the planet.
It’s called the circle of life.
So are we ignoring the hundreds of species that have gone extinct this century alone? The thousands in the last?
REMEMBER THE CARRIER PIGEON! THE DODO! THE RIVER DOLPHIN! THE TAZMANIAN TIGER!
I do not remember the Tazmanian tiger, and there are still river dolphins, depending on the river. And dodos went out in a time before we understood or cared about these things. And what calamaties did they cause?
Gaze into your future, Evan:
http://dsc.discovery.com/news/slideshows/monster-jellyfish.html
Your future of being devoured by a massive jellyfish.
Also, sidenote, the california condor is extinct in the wild and only bred in captivity, the silverback gorilla is still very close to extinction, the blue whale has a population fewer than 11,000 (over 30,000, for example, were killed in a single year during their peak), and the humpback whale is at it’s lowest numbers to date (about 2,500).
So no, man. We may have forgotten about them, but these animals are not on “the slow path to recovery.”
Regardless, it’s about more than tuna. It’s about large swaths of sea life. That’s what the NRDC compiled a list for. Because there’s more than one fish being overfished and polluted.
Are you just playing devil’s advocate or do you really not understand the ecological balance? A single species disappearing invariably causes a calamity in their habitat, relative to their size and population, no matter how large or small. When several habitats are effected by several species disappearing before the ecosystem can adjust, there is no recovery. Not in our lifetimes, anyhow. Not anywhere near it.
Biodiversity has evolved the way it has for a reason. There is a symbiosis and it’s being destroyed. Why are you being so cavalier about it?
Of course I understand the implications, and of course I’m playing devils advocate. But on some level, I think it’s naive to think we’re capable of eradicating a species we use as a food stuff, for 2 reasons.
- When a species is hunted to dwindling levels for food, people notice, and then governments notice, and then we get things like the endangered species list that curtail or ban hunting so said species can recover.
- Pure economics. Say tuna starts getting pushed to the brink. The principles of scarcity arise and prices start to rise dramatically. Couple that with point 1 and suddenly what was this delicious fish that was so inexpensive and prolific is now a ludicrously expensive and hard to find delicacy. People move on, find some other common fish to gorge on, (most likely farmed) and tuna exists on the endangered species list for the next 50 or so years.
Yes, I totally agree that overfishing is a stupid idea that’s going to cause us nothing but harm, but I also don’t think we’re capable of completely eradicating entire ecosystems without stopping, albeit very late in the process, and deciding that maybe it’s a bad idea.
And I will once again return to my indestructible point – When has humanity ever given up something it likes for the greater good?
Evan: I agree that humanity has never given up something it likes for the greater good. Subsets of humanity have, but mankind in general….no. However I am also a complete nihilist and believe that mankind is a blight and humanity a cesspool. That aside, how do you jibe your confidence that we wouldn’t ever let something like this get to that point without stopping it, with that statement?
John: As someone who is adamant about evolution and darwin and all that, isn’t this just a logical and natural part of that? Also based on numerous posts and comments I can’t tell if you think this is more of an ecological or a culinary tragedy? And how do you rectify those 2 things? And also, on any number of other vaguely similar issues, you would take the role of the skeptic and want more data and less dispute on the issue before taking a side or would if anything declare the more cautious group to be alarmists or deploying scare tactics.
My contribution to the devil’s advocacy.
It jibes because I think the combo of economic principles and the small amount we’re willing to collectively do will lead to an eventual state of conservation. People will stop liking things that are cost prohibitive, and will no longer mind giving them up.
O.K. Then I agree fully.
You’re ignoring the fact, though, that you can push a species to the point of no return. Like with the Condor. Not extinct. But it’s going to be. If we push the levels of most of these fish too low, two things will happen:
1. Something will take it’s place in the biosphere, potentially making it harder for the fish to survive.
2. It gets increasingly difficult to find a mate and spawn.
It’s all chaos and randomness, but it is most certainly not a given that a fish population will recover when pushed to the brink, even if economic reasons make further fishing of it unfeasible.
How about we make a wager. In 50 years, if I’m right, then you owe me a great big, juicy tuna steak, which we’ll probably have to go to a fancy restaurant to get. If you’re right, then I’ll buy you one, but we’ll have to go to Japan, where they likes their endangered animals. If you’re really right, then you can say I told you so.