FISHING

or shall we say, nutritionally supplementing the reef fishes with expensive bait...

i´ve been trying to collect cabrilla on my own, 1 and 2 year olds. apparently only mexicans can catch cabrilla because i took my friend galis out to fish one day and he caught one. and he showed me some tricks. and i´ve caught every single other stinking species that exists minus cabrilla.

i´m leaving here in about 10 days. if anyone wants to come down and get the uni van so i can stay that would be awesome...



totally kidding if anyone from the university is reading this...

kudos to a colleague

this is in two days for anyone in the sacramento area!

If you want to hear Joe Merz being interviewed on public radio, there will be a live interview on Insight, Capital Public Radio’s daily talk program, at 2:40 p.m. Thu 8/10/2006.


| http://www.capradio.org/insight


University of California, Davis
August 4, 2006

CALIFORNIA WINE: COMPLEX AND SMOOTH WITH HINTS OF SALMON

[Editor's note: High-resolution, color photos are available by e-mail.
They show vineyards, rivers, grapes and animals scavenging fish
carcasses. Contact Sylvia Wright, below.]

What does it take to make a fine California wine? Grapes, water,
sunshine, the skilled hand of a master vintner -- and a few thousand
dead fish.

A few thousand dead chinook salmon, that is, according to new research
that shows for the first time that the salmon that die naturally in
California's Mokelumne and Calaveras rivers contribute significantly to
the growth -- and likely the quality -- of wine grapes raised nearby.
How? Wild animals eat the salmon carcasses, converting the
nutrient-laden fish into fertilizer for the grapevines.

The study was led by Joseph Merz, a Lodi-based fisheries biologist with
East Bay Municipal Utility District and an instructor at Sacramento
State University. Merz's research collaborator was his former Ph.D.
adviser and the leading authority on California native fishes, Peter
Moyle of UC Davis -- which also happens to be the world's premier wine
school.

Using a combination of their own new studies and other researchers'
earlier findings, Merz and Moyle examined what happens after chinook
salmon incorporate the rich chemistry of the northern Pacific Ocean
(carbon, nitrogen, phosphorus and more) into their body tissues, then
carry it upstream in fall and winter to their inland California spawning
grounds.

By tracing the movement of elemental "fingerprints" called nitrogen
isotopes, the scientists found that when the salmon die upstream after
spawning, natural scavengers move the marine-origin nutrients into the
terrestrial food chain -- either through their wastes or by dropping
fish carcasses onshore.

Merz and Moyle recorded 14 species of animals feeding on salmon
carcasses, including turkey vultures, raccoons, river otters, rats,
coyotes and even deer.

Before long, the nutrients travel through soil and water into wine
grapes being grown commercially along the riverbanks.

"What we found is that the grapes close to the river get up to 25
percent of their nitrogen from salmon," Merz said. "In wine making,
nitrogen affects yeast growth and sugar fermentation. No doubt some of
the best California wine has salmon in it."

While their results should enliven the table talk over dinners of wild
salmon and pinot noir, Merz and Moyle say there's more to it.

"Our study indicates that managing regulated rivers for salmon has
benefits far beyond simply providing fish for fishermen," they write.
"The marine-derived nutrients of salmon can positively affect both
natural riparian systems and agricultural crops, with considerable
economic benefit."

For starters, grapes getting one quarter of their nitrogen from natural
sources, rather than from commercial fertilizers, is good for the
environment and for the farmer's bottom line: In the Central Valley
region where the study was done, nitrogen fertilizer costs $500 to
$2,800 per ton. That does not include labor and fuel costs of applying
the fertilizer -- services performed gratis in this instance by
wildlife.

In an interesting aside, the scientists noted that the operators of
state-run salmon hatcheries, after they harvest eggs and milt from
spawning fish, routinely dispose of the carcasses rather than placing
them back in the river. "Hatcheries consequently could be removing
significant amounts of nitrogen of value both to agriculture and to the
local ecosystems," Moyle said.

The study, "Salmon, Wildlife, and Wine: Marine-Derived Nutrients in
Human-Dominated Ecosystems of Central California," is published in the
June 2006 issue of the journal Ecological Applications and was noted in
the news pages of the July 21 issue of the journal Science.

The research was funded by the East Bay Municipal Utility District,
through its financial support of Merz's doctoral study of using gravel
enhancement to restore salmon spawning in the Lower Mokelumne River.

The researchers thanked the East Bay Municipal Utility District's
Fisheries and Wildlife Office for help with monitoring; Woodbridge
Irrigation District for access to monitoring facilities; the California
Department of Fish and Game for spawning data and salmon carcasses; and
several local wine grape producers for access to vineyards.

Media contact(s):
* Joseph Merz, East Bay Municipal Utility District, (209) 365-1093,
jmerz@ebmud.com
* Peter Moyle, UC Davis Wildlife, Fish and Conservation Biology,
(530) 752-6355, pbmoyle@ucdavis.edu (Moyle is best reached by e-mail.)
* Sylvia Wright, UC Davis News Service, (530) 752-7704,
swright@ucdavis.edu

Deep Threats on the High Seas

from the washington post
article pasted here because you may need a password after today

Deep Threats on the High Seas

By Sylvia Earle
Monday, August 7, 2006; Page A15

For tens of thousands of years, hunter-gatherer societies relied on the natural world around them for food. Today some indigenous peoples still live this way and consume wildlife in a sustainable manner. It would be foolish for them to destroy the forests or plains that provide their food.

But, ironically, in our "advanced" society, we do just that. At sea, indiscriminate, careless, completely unsustainable fishing techniques are increasingly employed. They destroy the habitats that produce and replenish the resources. Commercial fishing has caused significant damage to largely unknown ecosystems in the sea; depleted numerous species of fish, seabirds and marine mammals; and doomed many others to extinction.


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With the depletion of many coastal fish stocks worldwide, such as the northeastern U.S. cod fishery, the fishing industry has moved on to the high seas -- the 64 percent of the ocean that extends beyond national jurisdiction. Fishing operations target the seamounts, oceanic ridges and deep-ocean plateaus where ownership and responsibility do not lie with any nation.

Mammoth trawl gear with names such as "canyon buster" indicate the colossal scale of the assault and the damage inflicted. In an action akin to bulldozing forests to catch songbirds and squirrels, nets mounted on massive rollers are dragged across the seabed, strip-mining everything in their paths. Sometimes a single trawl tears away as much as 10,000 pounds of sponges, corals, fish and other life from the sea floor, leaving a stark, sterile undersea desert.

The high seas are unique. Miles beneath the surface, in the absence of sunlight, animals derive energy from volcanic vents. Only in the high seas are there still some habitats free of invasive species. And only in the high seas do we find living organisms that are more than 8,000 years old, such as deep-sea corals.

These facts we know for the relatively small area of the deep ocean that has been explored. The living natural resources in the majority of the area have yet to be seen by human eyes. What especially sets the high seas apart from all other marine areas is the nearly complete lack of protection for any of this natural heritage. We owe it to ourselves and to future generations to change that. Through the leadership of the United Nations, it could soon happen.

Last month the U.N. Division for Ocean Affairs and the Law of the Sea released a report reviewing measures to protect the high seas. Ordered by the General Assembly in 2004, the report says that extremely vulnerable deep-sea habitats require protection but that fishing on the high seas often proceeds unregulated to the point of serious harm.

It notes that deep-sea bottom trawling is of particular concern, due to its tendency to result in the overfishing of both target and non-target species and to damage vulnerable ecosystems that provide critical habitat for marine life. The report cites an "urgent need" in some cases for interim steps such as a moratorium on deep-sea bottom trawling until formal conservation and management systems can be arranged.

U.N. member states have until today to respond to the report and offer their opinion on such a moratorium, which will be considered this fall by the General Assembly.

In conservation, action often comes after destruction has occurred. For the high seas, the United Nations is in a unique position to act before irreparable damage is done. With this critical decision, we can prevent the extinction of countless species and ecosystems that are only just being discovered, let alone understood.

To date, the moratorium is supported mostly by developing nations that do not have the financial resources to deploy costly deep-sea gear. It is opposed chiefly by a handful of countries with fleets of very large fishing vessels.

The United States has indicated that it wants to limit further expansion in high-seas bottom trawling for now, with the possibility of a moratorium in 2009. But three more years of trawls razing the deep-sea floor could cost us thousands of years of marine life in the making.

President Bush's recent declaration of extraordinary protection for the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands Marine National Monument was an outstanding show of U.S. concern for marine resources. Let us reemphasize our leadership in global marine protection with strong and specific support for a moratorium on deep-sea bottom trawling, setting an example for other U.N. members.

This is our chance to protect our last undiscovered wilderness before irreversible damage is done.

The writer, a marine biologist and a leader in the field of ocean exploration, is marine council chair for Conservation International in Washington.