Fishing gear awarded for saving marine life, MSNBC 4-22-05

[Guest guest]

Fishing gear awarded for saving marine life, MSNBC

4-22-05

 

Fishing gear awarded for saving marine life

$25,000 top prize goes to 'longline' that doesn't hook

sea turtles

 

http://msnbc.msn.com/id/7601005/

 

Secretariat Of The Pacific Community

This illustration shows the top prize in a fishing

gear contest -- a

system that doesn't use hooks in shallower water where

sea turtles

frequent.

MSNBC

Updated: 12:05 p.m. ET April 22, 2005Three designs for

fishing gear

that doesn't trap sea turtles, birds and other

so-called " bycatch " took

the top prizes in a competition held by the World

Wildlife Fund and

several partners.

 

 

Steve Beverly, a former high school biology teacher,

took the top prize

and $25,000 for a tuna fishing line that uses hooks

only once the line

reaches 100 yards below the surface. That's below

where sea turtles and

birds frequent.

 

“We’re all dependent on an ocean full of life and,

in turn, it’s

dependent on our actions,†Beverly, who is now

fisheries development

officer for the Secretariat of the Pacific Community

in New Caledonia,

said in a statement. “It’s just common sense to

create smarter

fishing gear.â€

 

Beverly found that fisheries’ logbook data and

studies indicated that

sea turtles swim and become hooked in shallower waters

than tuna.

 

In testing by three vessels in Pacific waters, 42

percent more bigeye

tuna were caught using Beverly’s new gear for what's

known as longline

fishing. That's because any bycatch is minimized.

 

Award sponsors hope that efficiency will encourage the

industry to

adopt the design.

 

A statement issued with the awards noted that Duke

University

researchers estimate more than 200,000 loggerheads and

50,000 leatherbacks are

accidentally caught annually by commercial longline

fisheries.

 

“These solutions safeguard our living oceans,â€

World Wildlife Fund

President Carter Roberts said in the statement.

“When World Wildlife

Fund began the Smart Gear competition, we looked for

real-world

solutions to protect the fantastic variety of marine

life, increase efficiency

and profitability for fishermen, and preserve the

bounty of the sea for

future generations. Today, I’m happy to announce our

competition

reeled in three promising innovations.â€

 

In addition to the grand prize, one $5,000 award went

to a team that

combined glowing ropes and stiffer nets to minimize

the entanglement of

whales. The contest statement said more than 300,000

whales, dolphins

and porpoises are estimated to die each year from

entanglement, more than

from any other cause.

 

A second $5,000 award went to Indian scientists for

their invention to

reduce the bycatch of juvenile shrimp and fish in

shrimp trawls.

 

Background on the awards is online at

www.smartgear.org.