Overfishing and industrial fishing
Did you know there are half as many fish in the ocean as there were in the 1970’s? Tuna, mackeral, and bunito have even declined by 75% as these are some of the more popular species. Now, 90 percent of the fish population is either fished to capacity or overfished. Simply put to words, overfishing is the constant taking of too many fish without leaving the space for the populations to replace through natural reproduction.
How does this affect marine life?
Overfishing hurts ecosystems as it is disrupting food webs. On top of food webs are top predators, like tuna or sharks. Others form the base of food webs, like salmon and herring. Entire ecosystems and fisheries can be affected when the populations of these fish decline or disappear.
Additionally, the methods used in fishing practices themselves are also causing significant harm to marine ecosystems. With industrial fishing in particular, nets the sizes of football fields are dragged along the sea floor (trawling or driftnets), taking everything with them and damaging ecosystems like coral reefs, kelp forests, seagrass meadows and many more. A lot of fish and other sea life is caught as bycatch, but tossed back overboard dead as they are not commercially valuable or not targeted in the first place.
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