What's a Salmon Lover to do? - Oceana USA
Home / Blog / What’s a Salmon Lover to do?

June 10, 2008

What’s a Salmon Lover to do?

BY: Emily Fisher

Yesterday’s New York Times featured an eloquently urgent op-ed about the demise of wild Pacific salmon. The author, Taras Grescoe, is swearing off salmon for two simple reasons: “it’s too scarce and too expensive.” While wild Atlantic salmon are already commercially extinct, the commercial Chinook season in California and most of Oregon has been canceled for the first time in 160 years. Grescoe reports that the collapse of the wild salmon population has no single cause, with many contributing factors, including degrading habitat, overfishing, global warming (higher water temperatures prevent eggs from maturing), infectious salmon anemia, and sea lice, among others.But an important cause that the author fails to include is the loss of Chinook salmon as bycatch. Industrial trawlers catching pollock and whiting kill Chinook salmon by the thousands in this manner, a practice that Oceana is

MOST RECENT

Up Next:

FEATURED CAMPAIGN

Plastic Pollution

Oceana campaigns to stop plastic pollution at the source — by working to pass local, state, and national policies that reduce the production and use of unnecessary single-use plastic and move toward refill and reuse systems.

Learn More

CAMPAIGN HIGHLIGHTS

Ending the Shark Fin Trade

Protecting Ocean Habitats

Responsible Fishing

View All

SHOW YOUR SUPPORT WITH A DONATION

We have already protected nearly 4 million square miles of ocean and innumerable sea life - but there is still more to be done.

Donate Here

Become a Wavemaker

Sign up today to get weekly updates and action alerts from Oceana.

Gift Center
Employment Opportunities
Contact
Financials
Privacy Policy

REGIONAL SITES :

International
Europe
Chile
Canada
Belize
Philippines
Brazil
Peru
Mexico

FIND OCEANA

TWEET TO SHARE OUR MESSAGE

Twitter