Marine conservation experts call on the European Council of Fisheries Ministers to prohibit fishing for endangered deep-sea species. The Council will meet on 14-15 November to decide on Total Allowable Catches (TACs) and quotas for deep-sea fishing in the North-East Atlantic*.
Source: BBC – Melissa Hogenboom
Off the north-west coast of Scotland, 3,300ft (1,000m) under the sea, life is thriving amidst an otherwise drab and muddy ocean floor.
Continue reading These Deep-sea Creatures Have Existed For 10,000 Years
Author: Senior Lecturer (Institute of Biodiversity Animal Health and Comparative Medicine), University of Glasgow
On September 28, The Conversation published an article: “Don’t fall for the deep-sea scaremongers – wild fishing is healthy and sustainable” by Magnus Johnson, a senior lecturer in Environmental Marine Biology at the University of Hull. The article criticised a paper by marine biologists at the University of Glasgow and Marine Science Scotland on the regulation of deep-sea fishing. The lead authors of the study, David Bailey and Francis Neat, respond here.
Continue reading Evidence Says It’s Time For A Depth Limit On Trawling
As officials meet this week to consider new EU legislation to manage deep-sea fisheries, a new scientific study highlights a pragmatic solution to protecting one of the most vulnerable environments on earth.
The International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) has published the first comprehensive assessment of the state of health of fish in European Seas and concluded that two of the three deepwater fish species mainly targeted by French industrial bottom trawlers in UK waters, off Scotland, are threatened with extinction.
The deep sea off the British Isles is teeming with cold-water corals, sponge fields, and a large variety of unique underwater habitats and species.
Continue reading Reforming the EU deep-sea fishing regulation: A net win for the UK
Source: The Herald
Author: Rob Edwards
The wildlife is thousands of years old, there are species upon species that have not yet been discovered and it is key to the survival of the planet.
Continue reading Our oceans stare into the abyss if we don’t back ban on trawling
This is a crucial year for the protection of the deep sea: the European Commission has proposed a ban on deep-sea bottom trawling, a practice described by scientists as the most destructive in History: huge weighted nets scrape the seabed at up to 1800 meters of depth and devastate in seconds ecosystems that are thousands of years old, while catching vulnerable species, some of which are endangered, in the process.
Continue reading Help us protect the pyramids of… Great Britain!
On 2 July 2014, the French Institute for the Exploitation of the Sea (Ifremer) released data on the activities of French deep-sea bottom trawlers that non-government organizations (NGOs) have been demanding since national multi-stakeholder negotiations took place in 2009. With the launch of the reform of the European deep-sea fishing regulation in July 2012, these data became essential to inform the public debate on the implications of the phase-out of deep-sea bottom trawling proposed by the European Commission.
Source: The Conversation
Author: J. Murray Roberts
Some years ago New Yorker magazine printed a cartoon showing a group of high society ladies enjoying an afternoon cup of tea. One lady turns to her neighbour and says, “I don’t know why I don’t care about the bottom of the ocean, but I don’t.”
Continue reading If the damage being done to deep seas happened on land, there would be uproar
