Fish & Fisheries

"Humans are throwing ecosystems out of whack by not only killing a large number of animals, but by killing adults and top carnivores in particular, a study suggests. One answer is to act more like animal predators."

"If humans hope to fish the oceans more sustainably, they are going to have to start fishing like fish, a new study suggests.

That means harvesting younger, smaller fish to leave more of their elders to continue maturing and reproducing. And it means fishing quotas that are more in line with what nonhuman predators consume.

"Male black bass and some sunfish in North Carolina rivers and streams are developing eggs in their testes, which can cause reproductive problems and potentially threaten populations, according to unpublished research."

"The lobster population has crashed to the lowest levels on record in southern New England while climbing to heights never before seen in the cold waters off Maine and other northern reaches — a geographic shift that scientists attribute in large part to the warming of the ocean."

"Conservation groups are accusing the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service of withholding research showing a federal plan to kill seabirds on the Columbia River would not actually benefit salmon and steelhead."

"A proposed regulation would prohibit imports from foreign fisheries that do not meet U.S. standards for protecting whales and dolphins under the Marine Mammal Protection Act."

"U.S. authorities banned fishing from Monday in most rivers and streams within the Olympic National Park in western Washington state, citing ongoing severe drought conditions that have harmed fish along the U.S. West Coast."

"Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe, never stingy with superlatives or shy about boosterism, has been bragging lately in a way that has neighboring Maryland steamed."

"From space, the fishing boats are just little white specks floating in a vast stretch of blue water off Papua New Guinea. But zoom in and there's the critical evidence: Two trawlers loading slave-caught seafood onto a massive refrigerated cargo ship."

"Seven years after the end of a much-lauded program to monitor mercury in Louisiana’s waterways, state officials lack updated data to warn people about any potential contamination in the fish they catch and eat."

"Unseasonably hot water has killed nearly half of the sockeye salmon migrating up the Columbia River through Oregon and Washington state, a wildlife official said on Monday."