1150 
mackerel reached its peak in 1935 and Pacific sardine in 1936, as did Pacific 
salmon. There may be some relation between the peaking of the two predomi- 
nantly southern California fisheries (although nobody has attempted to demon- 
strate one), but there would not appear to be any climatic, economic, or other 
relation between the drop off in those two fisheries and the one for Pacific salmon. 
It may be noted. however, that the drop off in production from these three 
resources which produced 2 billion pounds more in 1936 than they did in 1967 
amounted to better than 40 percent of what was produced in 1936, but that this 
drop off had been just about evened out by production from other resources by 
1967. 
The peak of production in haddock was in 1929, but this was related to a 
series of good incoming year classes and a strong market for scrod, not to the 
market crash of 1929. The high point in Atlantic perch production was reached 
in 1951, and of jack mackerel in 1952, but in each case the drop off since was 
related to factors not at all common to the two, or the general fish market. The 
high point in menhaden production was 1962, but the drop off since then is not 
related to market, which has grown sharply since then, but to lack of fish, which 
is almost certainly a factor of overfishing, although variations in environmental 
factors may be operating too. 
The declines in Pacific sardine, menhaden, and Pacific mackerel which has 
been, in toto, about 2,250 million pounds (or most of that total) seem to be quite 
clearly attributable mostly to overfishing. In sardine and mackerel the course is 
run and the fisheries are done; in the case of menhaden the decline has just 
nicely started. It has continued since 1965 when the catch was 1.726 million 
pounds. In 1967 it was 1,170 million pounds (about half its peak of 1962). Nothing 
has been learned. The State of California still has no effective machinery with 
which to bring modern management methods to bear on its ocean resource affairs 
and neither do the Atlantic coast or Gulf States. The Federal Government still 
accepts no responsibility in such matters. It has no machinery to deal with them if 
it did. Because of touchy Federal-State relations the Federal Government is 
even reluctant to mention these matters publicly, although in both areas it is 
the one that has had the research information from which overfishing and decline 
could be detected, and it has the jurisdiction, if it would only assert it, over the 
ocean area from which most fish and shellfish production comes. 
The decline in oyster production results from a combination of almost all of the 
mismanagement methods so far devised by the United States for its natural re- 
sources—overfishing, pollution (both domestic and industrial), silting of estuaries 
through poor land management, economic regulations of the fishery aimed at 
decreasing its efficiency (sail boats and rakes on parts of Chesapeake Bay), in- 
terstate fighting over comon resources (Maryland and Virginia in the Potomac), 
lack of economic incentive to farm (no tide land tenure rules in most states), 
ete. It is about as sorry a picture as the passenger pigeon, buffalo, and whooping 
crane, with no relief in sight on either a State or Federal level. 
The drop off in cod, Atlantic perch and haddock are not related to market con- 
dition, because the use of these three in the United States has continued directly 
upward. In the case of haddock and perch some overfishing is probably repre- 
sented, and in haddock this is presently serious. In cod there is no such effect. 
The major drop-off in the three is attributable to conscious action by the United 
States Government in letting the New England ground fish fishery decay since 
1948, and in not providing conservation management to haddock and perch re- 
sources lying in the high seas, a matter fully within its competence under the 
1958 “Convention on Fishing and the Conservation of the Living Resources 
of the High Seas”. 
Tt is not certain that the drop off in Pacific salmon since 1986 is much attribu- 
table to any partictlar thing that one can put a finger on. All five resources are 
being used fully. Perhaps one or more is being used too fully but not because 
of lack of regulatory intent or machinery. Furthermore the present low level is 
not necessarily a permanent feature. Market is strong and economic incentive 
could be improved quickly by repeal of a few of the more stupid state laws. 
The drop-off in jack mackerel landings is not related to resource strength, or 
to imports, or to bad management. The economice causes of this drop-off appear 
to be related to the decay of the sardine and Pacific mackerel fishery around 
it which has not left a fleet strong enough to subsist on jack mackerel alone at 
prices which will fit the product into any available market. 
