The Manchester giant grouper

The Manchester giant grouper: putting Manchester on the map for the wrong reasons

Dominic A. Andradi-Brown, Clive Hambler, Michelle L. Taylor, Elizabeth Wood

Last week we were greeted with the regrettable news that a grouper, "the third largest fish of its kind on record", an animal that lived out its life around the tropical coral reefs of the Indian Ocean, was flown to a fish market in Manchester, UK. What can be learned - or gained - from its fate?

The grouper was reported to weigh '30 stone' (192 kg) and be over 2 m long (6ft 5in), drawing media coverage in several British newspapers, the BBC and internationally. The market owner was quoted in the Manchester Evening News as saying this was a chance to really 'put Manchester on the map'. As ecologists we understand the excitement of seeing a fish of this size, as did the hundreds of people who visited, curious to see it in the flesh.

[Source: https://twitter.com/directfisherie1/status/808597957318758400]

As conservationists however, we were dismayed at how the story was reported in the media. Revealingly, the capture and transport of this grouper from a deep-water site near the Seychelles to Manchester, thousands of kilometres away, was presented as an impressive feat, with little critical evaluation - except by many of the online commentators on the articles. In an age of supposed interest in 'sustainability' it is remarkable that news outlets typically did not question whether such large predatory fish should be caught for food, or discuss whether flying it into the UK would be creating demand for species not found in UK waters.

We don't know for certain what this fish was (since it was reported variously as giant grouper, brown grouper or goliath grouper). However based on the published photos it's most likely to be the Giant Grouper, Epinephelus lanceolatus, a ‘Vulnerable’ species on the IUCN Red List of threatened species. Fishing is the major threat to this species, and being classified as Vulnerable means it is facing a high risk of extinction - as is more widely appreciated with other Vulnerable species such as Leatherback and Loggerhead Turtles.

[ Source: https://twitter.com/directfisherie1/status/808322703555969024]

There are several reasons why groupers should not be commercially fished for export markets such as the UK and why consumers here should not eat them. They are large predatory fish, and their removal from an ecosystem can have big knock-on effects on many other marine species [1]. The biology of some groupers may also make their populations particularly sensitive to losing large individuals to fishing [2]. Groupers are sequential hermaphrodites, changing sex from female to male as they become larger. We don't know the sex of the 'Manchester grouper', but from its size a guess would be that it was a male and likely to have been decades old. For example, similar sized Goliath Groupers from the Atlantic are estimated to be approximately 37 years old, with projections they can live to be over 50.

The conservation community has been surprisingly slow to condemn the coverage and consumption of this fish - although protest is now building. It may not be too late to expand on the public interest in this unfortunate individual - for the wider benefit of such species. Perhaps the legacy of the 'Manchester grouper' will eventually be to put the city on the map as a turning point in concern for exotic marine species, raising awareness of how to reduce our impacts - and resist temptation for the spectacular.

The Marine Conservation Society Good Fish Guide (printable and pocket-sized) and App suggests sustainable fish to eat, and also, importantly, which fish to avoid. For the reasons outlined above, it rates all grouper species as 'fish to avoid' and places them in the 'least sustainable' category. Brilliantly, this guide also provides a list of alternative, more sustainable choices allowing seafood consumers to easily switch to a similar but more environmentally-friendly option. Whilst we appreciate the Manchester grouper was just one fish, there are other more locally-sourced and more sustainable fish choices available. We hope the media buzz doesn't increase demand for groupers and other exotics in the UK. After all, in the case of Giant Grouper, and contrary to the age-old saying, there aren't plenty more fish in the sea.

References
[1] Dulvy, N.K., Freckleton, R.P. & Polunin, N.V.C., 2004. Coral reef cascades and the indirect effects of predator removal by exploitation. Ecology Letters, 7(5), pp.410–416.
[2] Coleman, F.C., Koenig, C.C. & Collins, L.A., 1996. Reproductive styles of shallow-water groupers (Pisces: Serranidae) in the eastern Gulf of Mexico and the consequences of fishing spawning aggregations. Environmental Biology of Fishes, 47(2), pp.129–141.

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How fisheries are run in the Pacific Northeast

Alaskan Seafood: a visit to learn how fisheries are run in the Pacific northeast.
Part 2
In July I was lucky enough to visit Alaska to learn more about how they run their fisheries. After visiting some salmon processing plants, I’m now off to see some salmon purse seine fishing in action before meeting with fishery managers and visiting one of the salmon hatcheries.

Competition vs team work

 Purse seiners working a run, Sitka.

Whilst in Sitka, we were fortunate to be able to go out and watch some purse seining for salmon just a few minutes from town. I was amazed at just how close to shore the vessels were operating. Like any fishing, salmon fishing is incredibly competitive and fisheries and companies are constantly monitoring conditions and the movements of the fish to try find the busiest salmon runs. It seems difficult to predict when some spots will be working and I was surprised to see just how small an area might be targeted. The fish runs are very specific, so there isn’t much room for many boats to target a run, but in many cases the fishers actually work as a team according to unwritten rules which dictate who can fish and when. The first boat to arrive at an active run becomes the ‘warden’ and sets the rules for that site. Essentially, one boat will put a net across the run to block it and aggregate the fish, whilst other boats will then take it in turns of fishing. Using this strategy, it seems like they catch far more for less effort compared to just fishing by themselves and directly competing with each other. I was told though that when 30 boats arrive at 1 site, some argy-bargy can still take place.

Well managed
There are few other places in the world that can boast so many green rated and certified fisheries across so many different species. For example, each year Alaska catches more seafood that is certified sustainable by the Marine Stewardship Council (And also the Alaskan RFM) than what the UK catches in total (certified or not) – more than 3 times over! Certainly geography plays a big part in this, and access to some of the largest fish stocks in the world (Like the Alaskan pollock fishery), but management also plays a key part. We were able to meet with representatives from the Alaskan RFM certification programme and  Alaskan Department of Fish and Game who are responsible for managing the State’s inshore fisheries to find out a little bit more.

It was clear that Alaskan fisheries are tightly controlled with restrictions on vessels, gear and licenses, with fishing limits set according to a Total Allowable Catch (TAC); access to which is granted through a ‘rights-based’ quota system. There are also hard limits on the amount of certain bycatch species that can be caught. This means that when a predetermined amount of a prohibited species is taken, the fishery is closed, regardless of whether it has reached the TAC of the target species.

As I’d heard earlier in the trip though, these controls are built on good data collection and scientific monitoring programmes and I heard again the expression, ‘data is our ally’ from Larry Cotter, who is Chair of the Alaskan RFM programme (among other things). Larry also noted though that the data that is collected must be available and it must be utilised in order to be beneficial.

Enhanced salmon fisheries
Enhanced salmon fisheries started in the 70s in Alaska and they now contribute about 36% (by number) to the total salmon harvest, so we were of course very keen to learn more about these fisheries. I had read about these fisheries in assessments beforehand, but seeing these fisheries in the flesh was an amazing experience

A lucrative product from the salmon fisheries is salmon roe / caviar, but each year the salmon hatcheries – which are private non-profit companies - collect and keep some of the roe for themselves in order to incubate and rear their own salmon, to be released and enter the fishery later on. Once hatched, the juvenile salmon are held for between 6-9months in tanks on land before being conditioned at a very specific site and then released.

 Land based tank holding juvenile salmon. Dipac hatchery, Juneau.

Before a hatchery is developed and a site considered, a comprehensive management feasibility assessment is undertaken to establish if – among other things - the local environment should be introduced to greater numbers of salmon. Sometimes sites are actually chosen for conservation and restoration purposes. There is also a requirement to harvest the hatchery fish so as to minimise the chance of them mixing with and increasing the salmon numbers where they weren’t intended. This sounds tricky; after all, once the fish are released in the wild, how can one be sure that they will be caught again?

This is where the innate homing skills of the Pacific salmon play an incredible role. Salmon don’t just return to their approximate home rivers. In most cases, the majority of them return to the exact river and site where they were released – and in huge numbers. The photo below shows some chum salmon returning to the exact hatchery where they were released just a few years earlier. I wouldn’t have believed it unless I’d witnessed it with my own eyes. The fish were literally jumping over each other to get back into the hatchery. There was no need for a boat – the fish simply returned home. 

 

Chum salmon literally jumping over each other to return to their home hatchery. Dipac hatchery Juneau.

 

The water outside the Dipac hatchery was boiling with salmon on their return home. Juneau.

The enhanced fisheries are of course not natural, and there are some important questions to be considered with regards to potential environmental implications. In particular, could the enhanced fish weaken the genetic strength of the salmon stocks overall?
It was pleasing to hear the Alaskan Department of Fish and Game take such questions very seriously and to learn that considerable research has been and is continuing to be undertaken to establish answers to questions like these. While research has indicated that the enhanced fish may not survive as well in the wild, there is no evidence thus far to suggest this has weakened wild populations. Ongoing research will be important to keep informing regulations and improving best practices and to ensure these fisheries stay sustainable for the whole ecosystem in the long-term. Something that’s important for all creatures who enjoy Pacific salmon.

Brown bear in a bear sanctuary, Sitka. Bears are one of many native species that rely on the wild salmon populations for food.

Sam Stone, MCS Head of Fisheries and Aquaculture

How fisheries are run in the Pacific northeast

Alaskan Seafood: a visit to learn how fisheries are run in the Pacific northeast.

Part 1

In July this year, I took an amazing opportunity to learn more about the Alaskan seafood industry and travelled with a team of UK and European commercial seafood representatives to visit some key fishing ports in the region.

We at the Marine Conservation Society (MCS) assess a number of fisheries from this region within our Good Fish Guide so we are familiar with these fisheries on paper, but nothing beats talking to those in the industry and fishery managers in the flesh to get a better understanding of how these fisheries are run - the products of which are increasingly being consumed in the UK. 

Ever eaten tinned salmon? How about fish fingers or pollock or wild caught fresh salmon from the supermarket?  If you have, then there’s a very good chance it was caught in Alaska. 

Seafood is a big deal in Alaska

We first arrived in Seattle where many of the Alaskan seafood companies have offices, and one of my first observations was that seafood is a big deal over here. It’s not just the cars that are big over here, their fisheries are amongst the largest in the world.

Our first meetings were with some of the largest seafood companies in the country, several of which are vertically integrated and own large (30-60m), modern vessels which catch and process their seafood at sea. These large scale operations can sound concerning, but the scale of operation has actually meant that these fleets are able to invest in technologies and develop practices which are industry leading in terms of sustainability. Some years ago for example, the O’Hara Corporation took the initiative of deploying their own scientific observers on board their vessels at their own cost to collect better data. Not the first time I would hear it during the trip, but the view of the company was very much that ‘data was their ally’. Whilst the observers are now Federal Government fisheries observers on-board, they are  still paid for by the industry, a stark contrast to the situation in the UK.  

Whilst in Seattle we also managed a visit to the famous Pike Place Fish Market (Photo below). 

It seems this place is as much a tourist attraction as other parts of Seattle eg. the birth place of Jimi Hendrix or the very first Starbucks, which our ‘cab’ driver proudly showed us.  As you might be able to see in the photo below, the market has made a name for itself for not only the produce it sells, but the uniquely skilled staff who accurately throw / lob / football pass fish from the ice to the sales staff to weigh when purchased. This combined with a fun and vocal comradery usually only seen and heard at sporting events, made this fish market really stand out. It was great to see so many staff enjoying their jobs and proud of their workplace.  

The famous fish throw caught on camera in Pike place Fish Market, Seattle

From Seattle, we made our way north into Alaska through the many islands and peninsulas of southwest Alaska   visiting the regional fishing ports of Ketchikan, Sitka, Juneau and Excursion Inlet (essentially a town based around a large salmon factory) which all receive and process a huge amount of wild caught Pacific salmon, in addition to other species like Pacific halibut and sablefish (otherwise known as black cod or ‘black gold’) and king crab. In these regional towns, it was clear there was another vibrant and progressive side to Alaska’s fisheries to the large scale ‘processing at sea’ vessels we’d been introduced to in Seattle. That is the smaller scale sector. A huge amount of the fish was being caught by much smaller vessels which were often family-run businesses. We were able to chat with a few families on their boats whilst in port (or at the local pub after hours) who were more than happy to talk about their work in these beautiful surroundings.  I was surprised at just how approachable the people were. 

A lot of towns and communities are entirely dependent on the salmon fisheries, with everything revolving around when the fish show up. It was easy to see why when I  learnt that the total salmon catch is roughly the same size as half of the UK total annual catch of fish across all species.  

The salmon season

I hadn’t fully appreciated the true seasonal nature of the salmon fisheries here and the marked differences between the various salmon species. There are five different salmon species that are caught in the region:

•  King
• Coho
• Sockeye
• Pink
• Chum

These species migrate at slightly different times throughout the season to return to their home river to spawn. All the salmon species undergo quite a large physical transformation as they move from saltwater into ever fresher water. The salmon migration occurs between March and November with various peaks throughout this period depending on the species and year.

The influx of salmon at peak times during the season is so large that the seafood companies need to process the fish very quickly into a format which can be either readily sold fresh or stored for later consumption eg. tinned, smoked or frozen. This is what has driven the hugely popular tinned Pacific salmon products which you can find in supermarkets the world over.

Chum salmon freshly unloaded and ready to be processed. Their mottled purple colouring is part of their physical transformation as they approach fresh water.

Handline caught fresh king salmon caught further out to sea before their physical transformation.

I next head out to see some salmon purse seine fishing in action and then on to meet the Alaskan Department of Fish and Game to learn more about how these fisheries are managed, and then on to see a salmon hatchery to better understand the enhanced salmon fishery.  

I am fast becoming a salmon aficionado...

Sam Stone, MCS Head of Fisheries and Aquaculture 

Future aquaculture challenges and innovation

The GOAL aquaculture conference here in China has just finished for this year. It has once again been an opportunity to learn and share ideas and information with a wide range of people from every sector and corner of the globe.

Some big issues were presented and discussed such as how the seafood industry tackles the complex and diverse challenge of ensuring robust social standards in the supply chain to how to mitigate for disease outbreaks.

It was my opportunity to speak today, I joined other panel members to talk about the role of innovation in aquaculture, what has been achieved and what are the pressing challenges. To my mind the most pressing challenge is ensuring the health and diversity of our marine and freshwater environments if they are to cope with the burgeoning growth of global aquaculture. We can only achieve this if we implement a robust planning process that has ecosystem health at its heart and environmental carrying capacity rather that economic capacity defines the boundaries.

Innovation in aquaculture panel session

 Dawn Purchase
Aquaculture Programme Manager

GOAL Aquaculture conference starts

The annual Global Aquaculture Alliance GOAL conference opened today with a fantastic opening traditional drumming ceremony.
 

Opening drumming ceremony

Today's theme started with insights into the Chinese seafood market and consumers, interestingly a lot of Chinese consumers buy seafood online, it seems strange after seeing so much live and  fresh fish offered for sale locally that people prefer to buy their fish this way.

Fresh fish at the local market

We also heard that many Chinese seafood lovers are unsure of how to prepare fresh fish and therefore prefer to buy prepacked fillets, faced with the challenge of dealing with the popular geoduck below I can see why!

Also interesting was how Chinese seafood consumers believe it is the job of Governments to ensure sustainable fishing and aquaculture takes place, to this end the third party certification bodies that we see in Europe such as GAA, ASC and GlobalGap are not yet established here.

One pleasing slide of day was the one that indicated the shark fin trade is in decline, as a conservationist as well as a shark lover I am delighted to see this emerging trend, this has been driven by concerns over food safety, a Government crack down on illegal trade and fake shark fins being sold. I just hope it is not too late!

Dawn Purchase

Aquaculture Programme Manager

Experiences from China

I am very fortunate to find myself in Guangzhou, South East China, attending the Global Aquaculture Alliance (GAA) GOAL conference. As part of GAA Standards Oversight Committee we are invited to attend these annual conferences as part of our role. 

This year as well as attending the Committee meetings I am also speaking on a panel session on Thursday talking about innovation in aquaculture and why I think it is important for the future of aquaculture. 

This conference is the highlight of my work year - meeting new people and old friends, exchanging ideas and information and hearing about the latest research and developments.

I will share more of this later but I wanted to tell you about my experience today. This morning a group of us had a 6 am tour of the local fish market, it was astonishing! A real emotional smorgasbord for me - amazement, intrigue, shock and deeply upset. 200 species sold, 210,000 tonnes a year, global imports. So much to see but the lasting impression was: How can there be any fish left in the sea when you see them sold in these volumes on a daily basis? Bearing in mind this is just one market in one city in one country. 

Busy seafood market at 6 am, 6000 people employed!

A small selection of the 200 species on sale 

I then went on to visit the Chinese medicine market,

I can now see where the 100 million sharks we catch every year go - dried shark fins abound. 

Chinese traditional medicine, note the dried shark fins on the shelf.

The ups and downs of this work  - some days I feel I am making a lasting difference, today I feel hopeless and helpless when faced with such evidence of man's exploitation of the oceans I love. 

We need to protect, cherish and love our seas

We need to protect, cherish and love our seas

NGOs are oft-criticised for crying wolf. Yet time-scales of people’s lives are extremely short relative to the geological change that occurs on the planet. Adaptation and evolution are extremely slow, clumsy processes that take time to catch up with environmental conditions. So, if those conditions change abruptly (over decades, centuries), ecosystems generally ‘change state’. And the shift in the condition of the planet is only apparent to current generations, with each successive generation forgetting the ecosystem of their parents.

As evidence of this thinking, some say we’re living through the sixth great extinction NOW - not in the future, but right now - as the result of mans’ activities. Is the wolf really crying, or are we crying wolf? The EU has been responsible for a great deal of harm (farm subsidies, ‘buying’ overseas fishing rights), but it has been progressive in applying measures to protect European seas. Over 200 marine Natura 2000 sites exist around the British Isles, covering something like 16% of our seas (alongside domestic MPA designations).

We’ve been working on better protection of these sites for a decade.Ten years ago, a local marine biologist in Falmouth contacted me about scallop dredging in the Fal and Helford Special Area of Conservation (SAC). Scallop dredging represents the worst level of respect for the environment, that devalues any protected area. But banning such a fishery any SAC was complicated because of the reticence of the then local regulator (the Cornwall Sea Fisheries Committee) to act.

The Sea Fisheries Committees (SFCs) weren’t effectively constituted to protect the seas, rather they principally protected the interests of fishermen – not a bad thing at all, but immediate action to protect the environment was not a priority. In this instance, the SFC didn’t want to conflict with local scallopers, and felt national governments and licensing agencies should deal with the issue. Eventually the fisheries minister stepped in to close the fishery in 2008.

This single case highlighted the unclear nature of governance of our network of European Marine Sites, and that something was needed to be done.Unfortunately Falmouth was not an isolated case, as similar measures and campaigns to close scalloping had already been initiated in Strangford Lough, Firth of Lorn and Loch Creran SACs in Northern Ireland and Scotland. Scalloping was an increasingly attractive in the 2000’s to inshore fishers because of the lack of whitefish quota, and increasing numbers of scallops on the ground. A concurrent fuel price hike in the mid-2000’s also created a market demand to fish closer to the coast for these tasty bivalves, over some of our most beautiful and spectacular reefs, sandbanks and maerl habitats.

Many sites used by scallopers were marine SACs, inevitably leading to damage.A change in the system for dealing with such damaging fishing was needed. The result of many years of advocacy, lobbying, parliamentary enquiries and legal campaigns by NGOs has led to two progressive measures that we should feel proud of: 1) The change in the regulatory regime of fisheries at the local site level in England, and a real desire to change management of MPAs in Scottish waters; and 2) a proper risk-based approach to dealing with the most damaging fishing in our marine SACs to meet their conservation objectives.

Progress since 2008 has been in the designation of more marine Special Protected Areas (SPAs), and a suite of exceptional SACs in England. In England there has been a change in the culture of inshore fisheries management, by creating Inshore Fisheries and Conservation Authorities (IFCAs) to govern and manage both fishing AND conservation of ecosystems, to replace the old Sea Fisheries Committees.

IFCAs are generally ‘fit for purpose’, and have enabled a change in management better than any other regulatory body. Scotland has recently protected large areas of her inshore vulnerable Marine Protected Areas (MPAs) from scallop dredging, and prawn trawling. Our MPAs will recover some areas of our seas, boosting productivity, returning biodiversity, providing sustainable incomes and increasing the ability of the ocean to function more naturally. Evidence from properly regulated and enforced MPAs in the Southwest and Scotland confirms this is the case.

Can we stave off the sixth mass extinction and the worst affects of climate change and ocean acidification? We genuinely may be able to do this by protecting, cherishing and loving our seas, and the people who work them. Let’s keep working with what we’ve got, and the laws that have enabled a more sustainable future. It really is for our children’s sake.

Dr Jean-Luc Solandt, Principal Specialist Marine Protected Areas, Marine Conservation Society