Eat a Sardine, Save a Salmon

<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/andrea_nguyen/5741616162/">Andrea Nguyen</a>/Flickr

Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.


There’s lots of good wonky stuff in this Oceana report (PDF) about the importance of forage fish in coastal waters along the western US.

The basic argument goes like this: Small fish—species like anchovies and sardines, collectively known as forage fish—play an outsized role in the ocean. They lie at the bottom of the food chain, and when we fail to protect them, we also endanger the bigger species that feed on them, like tuna and whales, and thus threaten the entire oceanic ecosystem. Unfortunately, Oceana warns, there remain “major gaps” and “severe flaws” in the way the west coast’s forage fish are being managed.

Oceana highlights several factors currently menacing forage fish; here I’ll focus one one: aquaculture. To raise carnivorous species like salmon on farms, we have to catch a lot of forage fish and grind them into fishmeal and fish oil as feed. How much? According to most estimates, it takes five pounds of wild-caught sardines, anchovies, and other forage fish to produce a pound of farmed salmon.

The Oceana report makes clear that the practice of transforming lots of little fish in the wild into feed for big fish stuffed into farms is having a dramatic impact on the ocean:

Despite marked increases in feed efficiency, aquaculture’s share of global fishmeal and fish oil consumption has more than doubled over the past decade to 68% and 88%, respectively. Total production of farmed fish and shellfish increased threefold from 1995 to 2007. Furthermore, a greater percentage of fish farms now use compound feeds that are derived from wild fish. While feed conversion ratios (amount of fish feed required per quantity of farmed fished produced) are improving, growth in the industry has resulted in an overall increase in the quantity of fish feed used. This growth in the aquaculture sector will likely drive prices of forage fish higher, creating incentives for higher catch rates in existing fisheries and making once uneconomical fisheries feasible. [Emphasis added.]

The situation is, in short, insane. Forage fish like anchovies and sardines rank among the most nutritious and cleanest foods one can eat. They’re loaded with protein and omega-3 fats, and—unlike carnivorous species like tuna—low in contaminants like mercury. Given that they play such a vital role in maintaining a vibrant ocean, it makes no sense to squander them for aquaculture. Instead, we should simply eat them directly. Despite their fishy reputation among many US eaters, they’re actually quite delicious in both fresh and canned form. For this week’s Tom’s Kitchen, I’ll whip up a simple, tasty, and economical sardine dish.

AN IMPORTANT UPDATE

We’re falling behind our online fundraising goals and we can’t sustain coming up short on donations month after month. Perhaps you’ve heard? It is impossibly hard in the news business right now, with layoffs intensifying and fancy new startups and funding going kaput.

The crisis facing journalism and democracy isn’t going away anytime soon. And neither is Mother Jones, our readers, or our unique way of doing in-depth reporting that exists to bring about change.

Which is exactly why, despite the challenges we face, we just took a big gulp and joined forces with the Center for Investigative Reporting, a team of ace journalists who create the amazing podcast and public radio show Reveal.

If you can part with even just a few bucks, please help us pick up the pace of donations. We simply can’t afford to keep falling behind on our fundraising targets month after month.

Editor-in-Chief Clara Jeffery said it well to our team recently, and that team 100 percent includes readers like you who make it all possible: “This is a year to prove that we can pull off this merger, grow our audiences and impact, attract more funding and keep growing. More broadly, it’s a year when the very future of both journalism and democracy is on the line. We have to go for every important story, every reader/listener/viewer, and leave it all on the field. I’m very proud of all the hard work that’s gotten us to this moment, and confident that we can meet it.”

Let’s do this. If you can right now, please support Mother Jones and investigative journalism with an urgently needed donation today.

payment methods

AN IMPORTANT UPDATE

We’re falling behind our online fundraising goals and we can’t sustain coming up short on donations month after month. Perhaps you’ve heard? It is impossibly hard in the news business right now, with layoffs intensifying and fancy new startups and funding going kaput.

The crisis facing journalism and democracy isn’t going away anytime soon. And neither is Mother Jones, our readers, or our unique way of doing in-depth reporting that exists to bring about change.

Which is exactly why, despite the challenges we face, we just took a big gulp and joined forces with the Center for Investigative Reporting, a team of ace journalists who create the amazing podcast and public radio show Reveal.

If you can part with even just a few bucks, please help us pick up the pace of donations. We simply can’t afford to keep falling behind on our fundraising targets month after month.

Editor-in-Chief Clara Jeffery said it well to our team recently, and that team 100 percent includes readers like you who make it all possible: “This is a year to prove that we can pull off this merger, grow our audiences and impact, attract more funding and keep growing. More broadly, it’s a year when the very future of both journalism and democracy is on the line. We have to go for every important story, every reader/listener/viewer, and leave it all on the field. I’m very proud of all the hard work that’s gotten us to this moment, and confident that we can meet it.”

Let’s do this. If you can right now, please support Mother Jones and investigative journalism with an urgently needed donation today.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate