An Unexpected Victim of Bycatch
Bycatch.
Bycatch is the accidental entanglement or capture of an animal that was not the intentionally targeted species of a fisherman.
Large scale bycatch is the result of fisherman using less selective fishing gear, such as long lines, which attract anything that swims by, or bottom trawls, which scrape everything in their path off of the seafloor. In some fisheries, the percentage of bycatch will even outweigh the percentage of targeted catch.
Thus, bycatch is one of the principal threats to the biodiversity and health of our ocean.
Marine animals that are often caught as bycatch are:
- Turtles
- Sharks
- Marine Birds
- Dolphins
Today, however, I saw first-hand a very different species fall victim to bycatch.
A human.
While my boyfriend and I were out surfing this morning, he was hooked by a fisherman on the beach. The fisherman was casting his line out into the waves where we and several other people were surfing. After catching a wave, my boyfriend jumped off of his board and felt a sudden pull on his ankle. After a moment of confusion as to what was happening, he looked up to see that there was a fisherman reeling in his line, pole bent, thinking he had caught a big fish.
But it wasn’t a big fish. It was a man.
Luckily, my boyfriend has only a small little puncture wound, and is completely fine.
Beyond the fact that he could have potentially been badly injured, or the fact that fishermen shouldn’t be fishing where people are swimming and surfing, this incident has really made me think about bycatch in a whole new light.
As the fisherman was trying to reel him in, my boyfriend felt immense confusion and fear and yelled out screams for the fisherman to stop. And in fact, the fisherman didn’t actually want to catch a human, so he stopped and “let my boyfriend go”.
Millions of marine animals experience those same feelings for the same reason: no reason.
Animals that are victims of bycatch are injured and killed for no reason other than the fact that they were swimming in the ocean, just like my boyfriend was.
Fortunately, fishing regulations, such as mandatory gear modifications and Marine Protected Areas can help reduce this waste, and are being implemented as much as possible by agencies such as the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
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