The frightening effects of commercial fishing!

This weekend I realized how unaware people are about the global crisis concerning commercial fishing when the chain-restaurant I work at on the weekends, Bertucci's, began selling wild-caught Chilean Sea Bass! While they assure it is from reputable sources, no sources are reputable, or safe for that matter. Chilean Sea Bass are a slow-growing species that breed late in life, so any fishing for them is extremely devastating for the recovering population. Also, each year approximately 200,000 endangered albatross birds are caught in the long lines of hooks used to troll for sea bass and other fish. Sounds really reputable, doesn't it?

You may or may not know already that 29% of all fished species are down in population by 90%! Yes, that's correct, many currently fished species are down to the last 10% of the populations compared to 50 years ago and in 50 more, at the rate we are going, they will all be extinct! Let me just sat that again, EXTINCT! That means they will disappear from the planet for good!

The scariest part is it's not just the fish we have to worry about, but countless other species and habitats are being destroyed in the process. One of the most destructive fishing methods is trolling for shrimp. The shrimp trollers drag nets across the sea floor over and over destroying the fragile coral reefs and killing countless edangered species. Did you know that 80-90% of the catch from a shrimp troll contains non-shrimp species. To put that in perspective, for every pound of commercial shrimp, about 10 pounds of other sea life ended up being killed in the process. Sickening, isn't it?

Like many vegans/vegetarians, sadly, fish was the last animal product I gave up because of my love affair with sushi. Now, I only eat the vegetable rolls and I don't miss the fish one bit! As long as there is wasabi and soy-sauce, it tastes like sushi to me!

Please do your part and give up, or at least cut down on your fish intake! The oceans and planet will thank you. Also, please watch the following videos I have provided, which show even more detail about the fishing crisis and what you can do to help. If you are into podcasts, I recently discovered and amazing one on iTunes called Vegetarian Food for Thought, be sure to check out the episode entitled, Fish Consumption and By-Catch! It was very eye-opening for me and I know it will be for you as well.

As always, don't forget to voice your opinions in the form of a comment, so I can better direct my information to your own personal interests.

PETA2.com

Part 1


Part 2


Part 3


Also, visit www.compassionatecooks.com to learn more about living vegan!

REMEMBER, SPREADING THE WORD IS THE MOST IMPORTANT THING YOU CAN DO TO HELP!

Comments

Post a Comment

Questions/comments/concerns?

Popular posts from this blog

Raw Food Homophobes

Image
While a raw food diet truly makes no sense for an ethical vegan , there’s another unethical consideration that should be taken into account. There’s a lot of evidence that many males in the raw foods movement are flat out homophobic. Not only homophobic, but also ignorant and disgusting bigots. Take the Raw Brahs for example, who recently made an extremely homophobic video featuring the self-proclaimed “ Life Regenerator .” The video features them taking a shower together and making homophobic statements and gestures to each other. The Raw Brahs are, to their own admission, “ solar powered Christian raw food radically honest nomadic elitist minimalist brothers .” In a book entitled, The Raw Controversies , page 118 cites that, “According to David [Wolfe] , Durian was a gay guy that went raw, and then 'left the dark side' and decided to go for women. David and Stephen [Arlin] were convinced that homosexuality could be 'cured' by the raw food diet. More speci
Read more

Giveaway! Peta's Vegan College Cookbook

Image
Since I have been slacking on the frequency of my posts, as I am extremely busy and will continue to be for the next two weeks, I figured this would be a great time to make it up to all of you and give something away. In fact, I will give TWO things away!! Yes, I have in my hands two copies of PETA's Vegan College Cookbook and I must tell you that it's quite amazing. No, I'm not just saying that because I got a free copy ;) As most of you know, I'm pretty anti-cookbook because I feel most recipes are way too complicated and expensive, but this cookbook certainly debunks that theory. In fact, most of the recipes have about 5 or less ingredients and every recipe looks super quick, super easy, and super cheap! So, enough with the endorsement and on with the giveaway! What do you have to do to win a copy? Simply post a comment. That's all. I have two copies to give away and I will pick two random winners. Here's a preview of the prize at hand: So, post yo
Read more

Guest Blogger: Melanie Joy, Ph.D., Ed.M.

Since I've been running short on time lately, I thought now would be the perfect opportunity to invite a guest blogger on board. You might remember I interviewed Melanie back in August on Eating Consciously Podcast #13 . I've read the book and I give it five stars all the way! If you haven't pre-ordered it yet, I HIGHLY recommend that you do. Make sure you get a copy not only for yourself, but copies for the carnists in your life as well. Since this is a bit of a lengthy post, I won't take up too much more of your reading time, but I wanted to point out that you might be interested in watching this new two-minute video about the book: and now I'll let Melanie tell you a bit more about the book herself... Like most people, I grew up eating meat. I also grew up with a dog, who was my best friend throughout my childhood. And like most people, I didn’t think about how I could love my dog yet eat other animals daily without thinking about what I was doing or why.
Read more