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FISHING

Why you should care about an orange fish at the bottom of the ocean that you will never see

On the cover of issue 4 of New Zealand Geographic is a close up of an orange roughy, eyeballing photographer Kim Westerskov from inside a trawl net. It was dragged up from the rolling shoulder of a seamount, through 1000 metres of dark water to be landed on the roiling deck of a monster fishing trawler, more than 20 tonnes in a single set. On this trip it took just 43 hours to fill the boat—200,000 kilograms of fish, then back to port to unload.

The accompanying cover story, written by Warren Judd in 1989, highlighted rapid industrialisation of the fishery and concerns over its sustainability. It raised a critical eyebrow at gargantuan catches made possible by joint ventures with foreign vessels. Judd, a scientist, noted the common trajectory of fish stocks—the gold rush to catch as much as you can as fast you can, until the quota system kicked in with just 20% of the species remaining… then fishers chip away at the long tail, bound by a total allowable catch that attempts to maintain a fishery teetering on the edge of collapse.

“Industry loves the large hauls of the knock-down phase, but is reluctant to switch to the small catches of sustained yield,” he wrote, “especially if it has invested in plant during the boom.”

The feature also highlighted that orange roughy are a slow-growing species, living longer than humans, and as a result were vulnerable to overfishing. Judd cited Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries surveys that indicated orange roughy populations had declined by 50% in just a few years. Despite this, fishers insisted that stocks remained abundant, leading to conflicts over quota reductions. The story pointed to significant gaps in knowledge about behaviour of the species, spawning and movements, making management decisions more uncertain. And issued a grim forecast: that unless strict conservation measures were enforced, the orange roughy fishery risked total depletion.

Check that date again. 1989. A generation ago. And very regrettably, New Zealand Geographic’s long-range forecast has come true.

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MORE STORIES ABOUT ORANGE ROUGHY:

• Orange roughy on the line
• Deep water fishing

FISH OF THE YEAR

A vote for the orange roughy is a vote for the environment

You may not have heard of Fish of the Year, obsessed as we are by celebrity birds, but this year's aquatic popularity contest deserves your participation. Voting opens at 9am Saturday morning in this election run by the Mountains to Sea Conservation Trust. To gather support around their judicial review, Environmental Law Initiative are managing the orange roughy campaign. If the fate of this fish concerns you, cast a vote in support. (There were only 1000 votes cast last year, so you can swing this election.)

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PARTNER CONTENT

Home on the range

Three pot plants, a barbecue and four bikes—we load up Toyota’s fully electric car for a classic southern summer roadie and discover that electric road tripping is getting much easier—and that the bZ4X can do pretty much everything the petrol equivalents can do, at lower cost, and without the emissions.

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