OCEANOGRAPHY 195 



If you think that our view on ocean researcli is too doIUir conscious we can 

 only reply that tliis is our place in the scheme of things. Millions of tons of the 

 fin-est protein food goes to waste each year in this protein hungry world by die- 

 ing, decaying, and returning to the food cycle of the sea uuharvested and unused 

 by man. It is the function of the commercial tisherman to get that food from 

 the ocean onto the consumer's plate. This has to be done at a price the consumer 

 will pay. It is a highly competitive, and a high-risk business. Thus the dis- 

 tant water commercial fisherman bends his every thought to costs. Ocean studies 

 have the possibility of reducing his cost: if they do he can perform his function 

 more fully and more efficiently. Therefore the commercial tisherman looks at 

 ocean research from the standpoint of how it will reduce his costs most effectively 

 and quickly. 



CONSEKVATIOX AXD OVERFISHING 



The general laws of population dynamics which govern and define conserva- 

 tion and overfishing have lieen worked out over the past 50 years. They are 

 well known. In fact they were agreed upon by 82 nations at the First Geneva 

 Conference on the Law of the Sea in 19.1S and incorporated l)y them as the 

 base of the Convention on High Seas Fishing and the Conservation of the 

 Living Resources of the Sea. Advice and consent to the ratification of this 

 treaty by the U.S. Government wa.s given by the U.S. Senate this session of the 

 Congress. It will provide the international charter for the management of the 

 high seas fisheries of the world for our generation. 



Generally speaking a stock of fish in the ocean is most abundant, and the 

 average size of the individuals in it is largest, in a state of nature before any 

 fishery .starts upon it. Also it is at its most wastefiil level then be<'ause none 

 of it is being used by man. Natural mortality is killing off enough of the stock 

 each year to keep its level in balance with the rest of the living environment 

 a.ssociated with it. This natural mortality returns the excess po])ulation to 

 the food chain of the ocean in which it circulates ad infinitum without serving 

 any purpose for mankind. 



As the fi.shery on this stock of fish begins two key things begin to happen : 

 (a) The total abundance of fish in the stock begins to decrease; and (h) the 

 average size of the individual fish in it decreases (because the average age of 

 fish in the stock is decreasing). The third thing that is happening at the same 

 time is that the .stock of fish is becoming useful to mankind and the useful 

 productivity of the stock increases as its abundance and average individual 

 fish size decreases. One of the ])rincipal reasons for this is that .some of the 

 fish the fishery takes would have died naturally and l)een lost had they not 

 been caught. Also the lowered abundance of the population makes more food 

 left for the rest, which enhances their chance of survival and also it lessens 

 the natural losses to predators, etc. The net effect of thi.s is that as the fishery 

 takes more fish from the stock, the stock continually increases its useful pro- 

 ductivity, and also its resiliency to natural factors. 



The relationship,s described above work only up to a certain point. Beyond 

 this point the fishing mortality plus the remaining natural mortality begins to 

 exceed the total productivity of the stock. At this point, and beyond it. the 

 more the stock is fished the more the abundance continues to fall ))ut so does 

 the useful product, or catch. Thus the more you fish lieyond this point of 

 maximum .sustainable jtroductivity the less your catch comes to, the more your 

 cost per ton of fishing increases, and the profit of the enterjn-ise rapidly fades. 



This is the point at which the nations are agreed that restrictive regulations 

 shall be placed upon the fishery for that stock of fish — the point at which the 

 stock of fish is producing its maximum sustainable annual crop of food or other 

 product useful to man. It is the ta.«;k of the marine fishery scientist to deter- 

 mine this point and for the conservationist to frame regulations which will 

 prevent the fishery from exceeding that level of intensity. 



All of this sounds straight forward and simple, but it is anything but that. 

 To begin with there is no direct way of telling how many iiulividual fish are 

 in the stock of fish, like there is of counting cows in a pasture. The albacore 

 tuna of the North Pacific (for instance) migrate widely and iterhaps regularly 

 across the entirety of that ocean. Albacore that are tagged off Mexico and 

 southern California are caught off southern .Tapan. Other albacore that are 

 tagged north of Hawaii are recaught both off southern .Tai)an and southern Cali- 

 fornia. They are impossible to count: the pasture is too large. 



