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Turtles Saved By New Hooks
Here's the recipe for saving sea turtles from drowning in the longline fishery. Switch out the classic J hooks for circular hooks. Add a little training and the tools to release turtles accidentally hooked.
A new report by the World Wildlife Fund and the Inter-American Tropical Tuna Commission (IATTC) finds the new hooks dramatically reduce the bycatch of marine turtles without impacting fishing activity. They analyzed 4 years of data from 8 Eastern Pacific countries: Mexico, Panama, Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Colombia, Ecuador, and Peru. They found up to 89% reductions in the marine turtle bycatch per thousand hooks, and that 95% of all turtles caught in longline fishing were recovered alive. Circle hooks performed as well as J hooks in the catch rates of tuna, billfishes and sharks fishery.
Okay, well the tuna, billfishes, and sharks fisheries compose a whole other thorny issue. One as deserving of solutions as the sea turtles. The big fish of the sea are in superserious trouble and also need a reprieve from the hooks, like, right this second. . .
But in terms of this sea turtle story. . . "Our goal is to reduce the incidental catch of marine turtles from the long-line fishing operations without affecting the fisheries activity which is a main source of food and income for local communities," explained Martin Hall, Principal Researcher for the IATTC.
So, thumbs up on the turtle hooks. Thumbs up on helping local communities with food and income issues. Big thumbs down on continuing to overfish the big fish.
Julia Whitty is Mother Jones' environmental correspondent, lecturer, and 2008 winner of the Kiriyama Prize and the John Burroughs Medal Award.
Excellent... the only thing we now have to do is educate people not to buy the shells and the turtles are in with a fighting chance.
I'm happy to hear the success in turtle take reductions in the HMS fishery.
I am looking for new ideas in the bottom long-line fishery,any ideas can be emailed to brooks3glen@yahoo.com
Some of the ideas we came up with are hook guards to shield hooks during deployment and retrieval of gear to reduce the chances of snagging turtles in the water column.Another idea is a weak link in the leader closest to the hook in order for a turtle to free itself to resurface for air.
These are just ideas right now and must be tested and perfected.
Glen Brooks
941-920-7302
Turtle bycatch is still a problem in the gulf of mexico longline fishery. I'd like to look at the data they evaluated, can you cite your references for their huge claims of reductions. The fact of the matter is post release survuval rates are still an enigma depending on how the turtle was hooked. Also, seeing first hand that dehooking devices are hardly used (as a govt observer on tuna boats) the majority of the time the leader is simply cut before expending the energy to bring a turtle on board. Without a doubt circle hooks are being used and do reduce all sorts of bycatch but the dedication to the survival of the turtle is limited. Obviously a great example is the TED (turtle exclusion device) adopted in the commercial trawler industry where not only does the device save turtles but also reduces unwanted other bycatch.novel engineering strategies such as the ted could be the savior od many untargeted or commercially unviable species. There are many researchers at the univ. Of miami rosenstiel school (former employee) working on devices to selectively target including uding magnets and altered baits. Were still searching for that sustainability holy grail, as most others who value both conservation and socioeconomic vitality.