I don’t understand fully pollution. I don’t understand fully how chemicals and garbage affect the waterway. And I don’t understand fully how fish reproduce or don’t reproduce in a heavily polluted environment.
Yet, I could safely guess pollution can’t be good for the fish habitat. I always hear about commercial fishermen taking plenty of fish, I always hear about suspected poachers taking a lot more than their fair share, yet pollution I only hear superficial details.
I remember during the mid-1980s when medical waste washed ashore at Jones Beach. Red bag waste was found drifting in more than a few places. What happened? Back then hospitals weren’t permitted to burn red bag medical waste in incinerators so they had to cart the medical waste by boat beyond the canyons, pass the 100-mile mark. As the tide has it, the waste ended up floating back to shore. This resulted in seeing bloody medical waste on our shoreline.
This, however, is just one example of pollution. There are so many more, but I know of few with any kind of knowledge beyond superficial. I know that on the north shore, for example the Connecticut River, pollution flows into the Long Island Sound. The theory is, however, that the pollution will eventually wash out into the ocean. In theory that is. And there are other rivers on the north side of the Sound that is polluted, or should I say toxic.
It just can’t be good for the fish population. I mean would anyone like to walk into a room with a stinking, broken refrigerator with month old food inside. Of course not. Or walk into a room with the foulest, rotten odor imaginable. Or course not. Or to see traces of old, crusty, mildew laded food on the table to eat in case of hunger. Of course not. But with pollution these sort of problems could be faced everyday by fish swimming in our waters. That’s why I think pollution has been one of the reasons for the low number of fish in our waters.
Low numbers of course compared to five years ago not thirty years. In the mid-2000, fishing wasn’t great but there were fish out there to be caught and cooked. It was not an uncommon day to land 10 cocktail bluefish in 2003. It wasn’t even to land a couple of keeper flukes when the size limitation was 17”. So I spend time today trying to figure out where fishing has turned for the far worse.
I hear this and that about the commercial fishermen. I have also talked to them and they tell me the same thing as the recreational guys. Government regulations stink. The commercial guys told me they have to drop back about 40% of their catch, for the most part killed in the nets, because of government regulations. It sounds logical so I believe it. Plus there aren’t as many commercial trawlers in New York as there is in Massachusetts, New Jersey and North Carolina. Once again, however, I could only discuss the topic with limited information. I read the NOAA web site once in a while to see the commercial catch but outside of that, I really don’t know much.
And I truly don’t know much about waterway pollution. I just sense that it spells trouble. To have stinking, rotten water just can’t be healthy and good for fish. That’s all I could guess. Outside of that I am clueless.
Nonetheless, I could make a safe guess, however, that it ain’t good, and outside of making sure I collect all of my garbage on the beach, there isn’t much I could do about it except complain.
