The Dickens You Say! (A brief history of the Atlantic Cod).

The scene: bedroom of Ebeneezer Scrooge, commercial fisherman, somewhere in New England, late in the evening.  The ghost of his former partner, Jacob Marley, appears through the wall.

Jacob: Ebeneezer, Ebeneezer, wake up!

Ebeneezer (groggily): Jacob, oh my goodness, is that really you?

Jacob: It is, indeed, Ebeneezer.  I come with a warning for you.

Ebeneezer: What is that you are all tied up in?

Jacob: Those are the fishing nets we used in life, Ebeneezer.

Ebeneezer: Looks darned uncomfortable.

Jacob: Trust me, it is, but that’s not the worst of it by far.  Not at all.  So that you can learn more, you will be visited by two ghosts tonight.

Ebeneezer: Two ghosts?  Sounds vaguely familiar.  Aren’t there supposed to be three?  Are you going cheap on me?  You always were a cheapskate, Jacob.

Jacob: When the clock strikes one, all will be revealed!  (He disappears into the mist).

Ebeneezer: What a crazy dream!  I knew I shouldn’t have had fish for dinner tonight!

Later that evening, the clock strikes one. The Ghost of Atlantic Cod Past. a large fish, enters the bedroom through the wall.

Ghost: Ebeneezer, wake up!

Ebeneezer:  (in terror) Oh, please, no, let me sleep.

Ghost: You have slept long enough.  Tonight, your eyes will be opened.  I am the Ghost of Atlantic Cod Past – take my fin and we will trawl for knowledge of your region’s past.

Ebeneezer: Rather ironic, I’m trawling with a fish, rather than for a fish.

Ebeneezer and the Ghost leave the bedroom and arrive in the port of Gloucester in 1800’s Colonial New England, overlooking the harbor.

Ghost: Did you know that fishing was our country’s first industry?  Hundreds and hundreds of those schooners you see operated out of several New England ports, catching cod with actual baited lines.  There was no refrigeration yet, so cod was “salted” at sea to preserve it.  Salt cod was then sold all over the world, and related industries like boat building also boomed.

Ebeneezer: Fascinating, if just a little primitive.

Ghost:  Primitive?  I’m guessing you never read “Captain’s Courageous” by Kipling?  You might change that description to adventurous if you had.

Ebeneezer:  Hmmm, never heard of it, can I get it on my Kindle?

Ghost: Not from here you can’t! You’d have to go to a library or a bookseller.  But it is time for us to move on.

Ebeneezer and the Ghost arrive in New Bedford, circa 1925.

Ebeneezer: Ooh, steam trawlers.  Now we are coming up to modern civilization, something almost recognizable.

Ghost: The Industrial Revolution completely changed the fishing industry.  Trawlers, cold storage, and distribution modernization allowed fresh fish to be shipped far away from ports.  Species other than cod, like haddock and herring, were then targeted.  The popularity and “harvesting” of fish soared.  When fisherman “fished out” one area, they just moved on to another.  Scientists warned, even then, that this growth couldn’t be sustained.

Ebeneezer: Oh, come on, a few guys on boats started using nets rather than fishing lines.  How much damage could they do?

Ghost: Dragging those heavy nets across the ocean bottom damages marine habitats.  And, let’s see, ah, in 1930 alone tens of millions of haddock were “harvested” around Boston, and even more millions of baby haddock were just discarded dead at sea!  Fishermen were using nets with too small a mesh.

Ebeneezer:  So, of course, they acted quickly to fix that process, right?

Ghost:  Oh, absolutely, yes, 23 years later, in 1953, the first regulations specifying a minimum size for trawler nets were enforced. 

Ebeneezer:  Hmmm, well, you know there was no internet in those days.  And you had to spin a dial on a phone several times to make a call.

Ghost:  Tough times for all concerned.  Particularly if you were a baby haddock.  But it is time for us to move on.

Ebeneezer and the Ghost arrive in Washington, D.C. in 1976.

Ebeneezer:  Hmmm, the U.S. Capitol, surely you aren’t going to tell me there’s a fishing frenzy going on here?  Or is it just time for the Friday Fish Fry in the Senate?

Ghost: No, this is where the Magnuson Act was passed, allowing the U.S. to control its ocean waters out to a distance of 200 miles from shore.  You see, profitability in the fishing industry had waxed and waned since the early 1930’s.  Stocks of various fish had dwindled, while the tastes of the American public changed frequently.  And a newer threat had arisen in the 1960’s: ocean-going fish factories, known as deep water fleets, were coming to Georges Bank from many other countries, all over the world.  These could do the work of a thousand of those old schooners and deliver consumer-ready fish in half the time.

Ebeneezer:  Well, that’s a good thing, right?  Protecting our shore from foreign interlopers?

Ghost:  Lots of people thought so at the time.  All the international fleets had to leave.  The government offered easy financing to build new, modern fishing vessels, mini versions of the factory deep water trawlers.  Unfortunately catch quotas were seen as standing in the way of this new, revitalized fleet and were abandoned.  By the early 1980’s, fish catches were again at record highs, higher than those recorded even during the time of the deep water fleets.  It just couldn’t last.

Ebeneezer:  Let’s see, we did just what the international deep water boats were doing, only more and better? There’s a saying, it’s all over except the finger pointing?

Ghost: Exactly.  One by one, the stock of cod, halibut, perch and flounder collapsed.  By supporting the fishing industry, the government was blamed for having contributed to the problem.  Environmental groups rallied to the cause, too late.  Even fishermen then clamored for more and reasonable regulations and fish quotas. 

Ebeneezer:  I suppose you could say there is a lesson in there somewhere for all of us.

Ghost:  Somewhere?  You have become a master of understatement, Ebeneezer!  I believe you have learned something tonight.

Ebeneezer: Ghost, I have seen enough to become seasick.  Please take me home!

Ghost: As you wish, my work is done.  But yours is not, you may expect another visitor soon.

Later that evening, the clock strikes two. The Ghost of Atlantic Cod Present. a much smaller fish, enters the bedroom through the wall.

Ghost: Ebeneezer!  I have come to enjoy your company tonight.  You have enjoyed the company of many of my brethren, haven’t you?

Ebeneezer: Bah, humbug!  Can you come back in the morning?  I really need my beauty sleep. Yikes, is this a dream or a nightmare?  You are not looking well, ghost.  Why so emaciated?

Ghost:  A lot of the small prey that I eat are gone.  Decades of overfishing really upset the balance of the ecosystem.  For a while the population of the fish that I eat exploded, but then their prey, the zooplankton, declined.  It’s a complicated world, you know.

Ebeneezer:  But surely you can just come back?  Fishing moratoriums have been in effect, on and off, for going on twenty years now. 

Ghost: Scientists aren’t completely sure.  There’s a lot of factors involved, probably more than we understand.  The population of seals that prey on me.  Nutrients and pollution in the ocean.  Global warming.  Ocean currents.  Your fishing moratoriums have helped, just in time for sure. We’ll see.  The last measurement of my population in Georges Bank was about 10% of a target goal.

Ebeneezer:  Well, that’s a relief. 

Ghost:  Swell.  I’ve assuaged your conscience, my work here is done.  You can safely keep eating your scrod.  Back to bottom-feeding for me!

Later that evening, the clock strikes three. The ghost of Jacob Marley returns to the bedroom through the wall.

Jacob: Ebeneezer, I’m back! You said you wanted a third ghost.

Ebeneezer: I’m tired, but I think I’d prefer the Ghost of Atlantic Cod Future, no offense to you.  To wrap it all up for me.

Jacob:  I couldn’t find any volunteer in that category, that population is distinctly lower than it once might have been.  Didn’t you learn anything tonight?

Ebeneezer:  Oh, come on, I had cod earlier this evening, how bad can it be?

Jacob:  Are you sure it was cod?  Restaurants are known for disguising their fish very well.  Have you ever eaten Chilean Sea Bass?

Ebeneezer:  Sure, many times.  I have a refined palate, you know, and it has a distinctive flavor.

Jacob:  Actually, what you ate was Patagonian toothfish.  Another fish that was threatened when it’s popularity exploded.  Those marketing people are quite good.

If you did have cod, it could have also been from Iceland or Norway, another reason fish is so expensive these days.  They are doing some good things there, though, fishing sustainably, some even using hook-and-line gear.

Ebeneezer: You’re kidding, talk about primitive!

Jacob: Sheesh, you are not making this easy.  I have two questions for you.  At its low point, the cod population in the ‘90s was about 4% of what it was in the Atlantic in 1850, 150 years ago, by our best measurements.  What do you think would happen if, because individual farmers wanted to make more money, 96% of all pigs, chickens and cows were killed off?

Ebeneezer:  Outrage.  Protests.  Marches on…somewhere.  Internet tweets exploding.

Jacob:  Well, yes, I will give you the latter, at least.  But the outrage over cod and other ground fish washed away in a sea of coulda, woulda, shoulda pretty quickly into hopelessness and apathy.  And we’d had decades to see it coming.

Okay, question number two.  How much of that initial outrage would be spurred by our thoughts of not being able to eat the dinner we like, or not being able to earn the income we are used to, and how much by the thought that we practically committed complete genocide on another Earthly, living species?   What does that say about humanity?

Ebeneezer: (Gulp).  You know, Jacob, I could use your advice.  I’ve been thinking of getting out of the fishing business for a while now.  The fun is long gone, what with all these crazy regulations.  Fishing, what a bore, let’s face it.

I need something more adventurous, something exciting.  You say those marketing people are doing great work, thinking up ways to sell stuff to people who need it?  Maybe I’ll give it a try.

Jacob: Sheesh, only in America!

 For a guide on how to choose sustainable seafood, click here.

For detailed info on the status of cod stocks in New England and Canada, click here.

To see info from the Environmental Defense Fund on Atlantic Cod, click here.