Saturday Short Subjects: “There are only so many fish in the sea…

Your choices matter.”

This sums up the raison d'etre of the Monterey Bay Aquarium’s Seafood Watch® Program, a frequent subject of my blogposts. 

The Monterey Bay Aquarium Seafood Watch® Program encourages consumers and businesses to purchase seafood that is fished or farmed in ways that do not harm the environment. Their science-based recommendations indicate which seafood items are “Best Choices,” which ones are “Good Alternatives,” and which ones you should  “Avoid.”

The information is compiled into consumer-friendly guides — one for the US as a whole, and others specific to each region of the country. There is also a guide for Sushi. Each guide offers a carefully selected, carry-it-with-you, subset of choices from the program’s full list of recommendations. You  can access the complete list online here, where you can also search for the ratings for a particular fish. You can also access the recommendations by using the free mobile app available here. 

The guides are frequently updated. The Seafood Watch Program®’s Community Outreach director, Ryan Bigelow, announced yesterday that the newest versions of the guides are now available for download here.

Here’s your chance to be among the first to have them.

Remember, your choices do matter. Together we can make a difference.

Why Saturday Short Subjects? Some readers may recall  being dropped at the movie theater for the Saturday matinee — two action-packed feature films with a series of short subjects (cartoons or short movies, sometimes a serial cliffhanger) sandwiched in between. Often the short subjects were the most memorable, and enjoyable, part of the morning. That explains the name. The reason behind these particular posts is that we are all short on time. My Short Subject posts should not take me as long to write or you as long to read (or try).

Meatless Monday: A Meet-Up in Monterey

Two seal watchers observed on our walk to meet Ryan. 

Two weeks ago my husband and I were in Monterey, California, where we had the opportunity to a real-life meet-up with one of my longtime online acquaintances, Ryan Bigelow, Outreach Manager of the Monterey Bay Aquarium’s Seafood Watch Program. Fish is a choice for many observers of Meatless Monday, so this seems an excellent moment to tell you a bit about our visit with Ryan.

We covered many topics while sitting outside near Fishermen’s Wharf under bright blue skies. We learned more about his role with Seafood Watch, his work with large companies to guide them in making better fish purchases, the criteria Seafood Watch uses to determine its ratings, the need for consumers to read labels carefully no matter where they make their purchases, and why sometimes food miles is not always as important as how the fish are caught or raised…

He also gave us lots of tips on how to spend our 5 days in Monterey. We began with an afternoon at the Monterey Bay Aquarium where we learned about the ecosystem of the Bay, explored the kelp forest, experienced jellyfish, found about the secret lives of seahorses, and discovered how sardines are cooked in their cans. All along the way we had many opportunities to take action to improve the health of the oceans. A favorite exhibit was the interactive diner where a menu selection elicits an entertaining video response on why the choice was a good (or bad) one. 

Jellies

We had a wonderful afternoon and a great week. More on our Monterey adventures in the days to come. 

In the meantime, check out the latest news and tools from Seafood Watch here. Be sure to download the Monterey Bay Aquarium Seafood Watch Pocket Guide which is right for you. Never underestimate the impact of your seafood choices.  

Happy Monday! Always remember your potential to make the world a better place.

I often blog on food or food issues on Monday in support of Meatless Monday, one of several programs developed in the Healthy Monday project, founded in 2003 in association with Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health and Syracuse University’s Newhouse School of Communications. Meatless Monday’s goal is “to help reduce meat consumption 15% in order to improve personal health and the health of our planet.”

Saturday Short Subjects: Introducing Seafood Watch

“There are only so many fish in the sea … Millions of animals are wasted each year …  Your choices matter.”  This sums up the message of the Monterey Bay Aquarium’s  Seafood Watch Program. 

The mission of the program is twofold:

• To raise consumer awareness of these issues and 
• To get savvy consumers to “step up to the plate,” by making choices that are good for them and the oceans.

The Monterey Bay Aquarium Seafood Watch program has compiled a series of guides recommending which seafood items are “Best Choices” or “Good Alternatives,” and which ones you should “Avoid.” According to information on the Monterey Bay Aquarium website, these recommendations are “science-based, peer reviewed, and use ecosystem-based criteria.”

The guides are continually updated. The newest versions were released just last week.

Regional Pocket Guides are available online for downloading here. 

The guides are also available as mobile apps for your Android or your iPhone. The mobile versions include the Project Fish Map, a database of locations where  “Best Choices” and “Good Alternatives” can be found. With this app you can help Seafood Watch “put ocean-friendly seafood on the map!”

There are even tools for chefs:

• A Buyer’s Guide and
• A Culinary Chart of Alternatives 

You can read more about Seafood Watch here and more about the Monterey Bay Aquarium in Monterey, California here.

Please step up. Together we can make a difference.

Why Saturday Short Subjects? Some readers may recall  being dropped at the movie theater for the Saturday matinee — two action-packed feature films with a series of short subjects (cartoons or short movies, sometimes a serial cliffhanger) sandwiched in between. Often the short subjects were the most memorable, and enjoyable, part of the morning. That explains the name. The reason behind these particular posts is that we are all short on time. My Short Subject posts should not take me as long to write or you as long to read (or try).

Fishy Friday: Good News for the Menhaden (and all the other fish in the sea)*

There was a very important victory in Boston on Wednesday, one that was lost among all the other headlines — turmoil in Italy, the storm off the western Alaskan Coast, GOP debate blunders… At its November 9th meeting, the menhaden board of the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission (ASMFC) voted to cut the annual menhaden harvest by 37 percent.  Those of you who read my first Fishy Friday post two weeks ago  will recall that the tiny menhaden, called the “most important fish in the sea,” has been overfished to just 10% of its historic levels. A critical food source for wildlife, birds, dolphins, whales, and fish including striped bass and bluefish, the menhaden plays a vital role in the ecosystem of the Eastern Seaboard. 

The Pew Environmental Group’s well-organized campaign, the Plan to Save the Menhaden, played a major role in this victory. The ASMFC received nearly 92,000 comments on menhaden harvest limits, the vast majority in favor of such instituting such measures. The new harvest limit, which is subject to a vote by the full commission in one year, would take effect in 2013.

“Today’s vote is a welcome step for a fish that hasn’t caught a break since Dwight Eisenhower was president,” said Peter Baker, director of Northeast Fisheries at the Pew Environment Group. “Scientists have warned that having too few menhaden in the water could result in disastrous impacts on the fish and wildlife that eat them.” 

Billions of Atlantic menhaden are currently being hauled in and ground up each year — destined to become fertilizer, pet food, dietary supplements [menhaden are rich in Omega-3], and feed for farm-raised animals and fish. Omega Protein, responsible for taking in 3/4 of the entire East Coast catch — more than 410 million pounds, will clearly not welcome this news.

The Plan to Save the Menhaden was a real eye-opener for me. For a while I had been focused upon “best” and “worst” seafood choices and hadn’t been thinking so much about the other fish in the sea and all the ways they were being used (and abused). But now I’m all fired up.

I’ve just signed on to become a Seafood Watch Advocate through a program at the Monterey Bay Aquarium so chances are pretty good that you’ll be hearing lots more about fish from me.

I’ve also been reading Paul Greenberg’s Four Fish: The Future of the Last Wild Food. I am inspired by Greenberg’s favorable assessment of the farming of barramundi. There’s a large operation in Turner’s Falls, Massachusetts [ironically, the site of the dam which ended the salmon run in the Connecticut River]. I see a future post on barramundi (AKA Asian Sea Bass) as well as a possible campaign to get this sustainable fish into the Elm City Market Co-Op. I guess I should taste some first. Stay tuned…


* and birds and animals, and people, too

Weekend Updates

Many readers told me they enjoyed the Weekend Updates I posted in late June so I’ve decided to make it a regular end-of-the-month feature.

Blog Updates (from oldest to most recent):

I have not seen a ladybug since one landed on me in March (3/20 post).

It is important to remember that the disaster in the Gulf is far from over (5/6 post).




Although oil has disappeared from the surface of the water in many places, serious questions have been raised about the amount of dispersants used and what the long-term effects of these chemicals might be.

The State Street trees in front of Channel 8 (5/17 post) are doing well despite the heat. Each tree now has a tag listing its species and information on how to request a tree of your own. Urban Resources Initiative (URI) emailed that they had planted 275 trees around the City of New Haven before “switching program gears to focus upon Community Greenspace.” Community Greenspace has assisted New Haven residents with developing pocket parks and community gardens throughout the City. 

The woodchuck wars continue to rage in Beaver Hills (6/16 post). My source tells me that the neighborhood shooter has switched to Havahart traps. He has caught at least one woodchuck baby (lured by some tender greens) and what happened to that unlucky victim remains a mystery. A skunk has been spotted heading under the garden shed, presumably keeping what remains of the woodchuck family company.

Chatham Seals

“Times Are Strange” (7/16 post) spoke of sightings of great white sharks off the coast of Cape Cod. On Friday, July 30, Chatham officials closed South Beach to (human) swimming indefinitely after three great whites were sighted by a spotter plane. One shark was spotted cruising along the shore just 100 yards from a large group (of humans) assembled in a semicircle near a “Happy 30th” written in the sand. Officials advise that people swimming where it is still permitted avoid getting too close to the seals.

“Where Have All the Codfish Gone?” (7/21 post) was tweeted by the Monterey Bay Aquarium and generated quite a bit of interest at several sites dedicated to fishing issues. A blogger in Iceland who promotes the Icelandic fishing industry left a favorable comment. This eclectic blog has stories and videos on a wide variety of themes relating to fishing and fish: http://icelandicfish.tumblr.com/

Other News:

The New Haven Independent has listed ontheroadtogreenness as one of its favorites. You can find a link to my blog on their site under Road To Greenness.

Single-stream recycling has come to New Haven. In short, what this means is that you now no longer need to sort your recycling before you set it on the curb — just dump it all into your bin. I know it sounds crazy, but this video explains how this is possible.



But wait, there is even more to the trash/recycling story! A pilot program in which your current largish trash toter becomes your recycling bin and a new, smaller one becomes your trash toter, is scheduled to start soon in the New Haven neighborhood of Westville. You can read more about it at the Independent.

It’s been very hot here. We have had a hummingbird feeder in the yard but have not succeeded in attracting any hummers. The Fat Robin sent out a newsletter advising that you change the nectar every two days during this time of extreme heat, especially if you have located your feeder in a sunny area. During cooler times, twice a week is enough if the feeder is in the shade. The Fat Robin also stated, “If you haven't been very successful with attracting hummingbirds to your yard, don't give up! The BEST time in Connecticut is yet to come (very soon in fact)!”

It is now the first day of August, too early for the statistics for July. The National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) has released its State of the Climate Global Analysis for June. NOAA reports that June 2010 was the warmest June on record, and that April-June 2010 was the warmest three-month period for the Northern Hemisphere.

During these exceedingly hot days in the Northeast we heard frequent references to the Heat Index. This site explains what the Heat Index is and how the formula was derived, provides a Heat Index Calculator, and includes a chart indicating that it is dangerous for almost anyone whenever it is over 90° and even the least bit humid.

Finally, on a somewhat lighter note, a friend forwarded this story about a person who is researching and photographing the world’s oldest living things. How old they are will blow your mind. For sure.

Where Have All the Codfish Gone?

For at least one boat in the Chatham fleet, July 5 was a good day. We watched it dock and unload its catch at the Chatham Fish Pier late that Sunday afternoon. The crew came home with a considerable amount of cod. But I have been going to Cape Cod since the ’60s, and this is not the catch I remember as a kid, or even a decade ago. These cod were smaller and made up less than half of what was unloaded — most of the remainder was dogfish.

Dogfish, a species of shark, were rarely seen in the past — certainly not when cod were longlined. The Pier Host on duty explained that in longlining some 4500 hooks, spaced 6 feet apart, would each be baited by hand.  As soon as the line was set out, the fishermen would begin to haul in the catch. Each fish was alive and fresh, and the small fish could be thrown back. This was how our host used to fish. But baiting is labor intensive, and the bait fish hard to come by. Boats in the Chatham fleet all use gillnets now.

Dogfish, a type of shark.

Dogfish get caught in the nets along with the cod — both are groundwater fish. They are subject to regulations of the New England Fishing Management Council and are currently worth 15¢ a pound. Each boat is allowed to net 3,000 pounds a day (until the regional maximum of 12 million pounds is reached) which about pays for the trip’s gas. The dogfish are shipped to New Bedford for processing—the flesh is sent to the UK for fish and chips, the fin to Asia for shark fin soup, and the reminder goes to fertilizer. Nothing is wasted.

Seals patrol the pier area.

In days past only sea gulls patrolled the dock area, waiting to nab any fish that might drop as the catch was loaded into the lifts. Today both gray and  harbor seals are a common sight. Seals have been protected since the Marine Mammal Protection Act became law in 1972. A rarity in Chatham waters in the 1980s, they have since become commonplace. They feed on the same small fish that cod eat and traveled to the Cape in pursuit of food and have stayed there. Seals are voracious eaters and ruthless killers. They have been known to catch a large fish, to rip out its highly-prized internal organs, and to leave the remainder of the carcass on the beach. Seals are certainly not a fisherman’s friend.

Cod used to be the average person’s fish. I remember a price of $1.99/lb. This year it was being sold for nearly 5 times that – $9.99/lb.

Where have all the cod gone? Why are they so scarce off Cape Cod?

The short answer? Over-fishing.

In Cod: A Biography of the Fish that Changed the World (Penguin, 1997), Mark Kurlansky weaves a fascinating and well-documented tale of this remarkable fish, its impact on the world’s economy, and its twentieth century decline. Gastronomes will enjoy the latter pages which offer six centuries of cod recipes.

Fishermen have been chasing cod around the world for over a thousand years, ever since they discovered a way to preserve the fish, traveling farther and farther as the nearby stock grew scarce. It was upon the trade of salt cod that early entrepreneurs in Massachusetts made their fortunes. A ten inch female cod can lay 9 million eggs in a single spawn, and a world without cod would have been unimaginable to the American colonists.

Cod, with their signature white stripe.

But cod is now, without a doubt, endangered. The governments of Canada and the US have each put regulations in place in the hopes that the cod biomass can once again reach a sustainable level. There are 200 mile fishing limits off the coasts of both countries. Some areas in the Georges Banks are totally closed to fishing.  Other legislative constraints include size limits, catch limits, and gear restrictions. The Monterey Bay Aquarium has listed Atlantic Cod as a species to avoid.

And what about the day boaters in Chatham and Provincetown, the last remaining commercial fleets on Cape Cod? Besides the rules about how they fish and what they catch, they are also required to equip their boats with costly radar so their location is always known. They must travel farther out to fish, and the cost of fuel has gone up. The invasion of the seals is not helping the situation.

Many Chatham fishermen were born into fishing families and see their way of life endangered. Some have retired from commercial fishing to operate charter fishing boats or to offer seal tours. But others have chosen to remain in the fleet. They know the supply of cod must be restored for their way of life to be preserved. Many of them are supporting a community-based strategy to help their fishing fleet survive.

And did we eat cod while on the Cape? I have to admit we did. It is not the day boater’s type of fishing that has wrought the real damage. Supporting the local economy and indulging a craving for fresh seafood trumped the Monterey Bay Aquarium pocket guide this time. The fresh cod cakes and fish and chips tasted great.