Yellowfin tuna, Thunnus albacares

A rather large motley group of people gathered round to meet the Vagabond Monday morning to feast their eyes on a whopper of a yellowfin tuna – one that weighed in at 405.2 pounds!

Mike Livingston, an angler hailing from Sunland, California, reeled in this amazing fish. It was sixty-one and a half inches wide and it was an astonishing eighty-five and three quarters inches long.

This catch, made on hundred pound test line after wrestling for over two hours, is due to be submitted to the International Game Fish Association to get it approved as an all-tackle record.

Captain Mike Lackey has commented that the IGFA rules were adhered to, so this amazing catch will out-shadow the previous record, a three hundred eighty-eight pounder, which has not been beaten since 1977.

“When the scale hit that number it was like the Super Bowl here,” explains Livingston – who also happens to be a retired school administrator – referring to yells of congratulations from a group of two hundred spectators, who were there to take in the weigh-in.

He was so tired out from battling this beast that he only caught one tuna more the entire trip out.

Lackey had first guessed that the weight of the tuna was somewhere around three-hundred and ninety pounds, utilizing a tape-measure formula which is not always all too accurate. He proceeded to freeze the tuna to help keep it fresh for the journey home.

You can imagine his surprise when he got the whopper onto the scales and it topped over four hundred pounds!

Congratulations Mr. Livingston!

Yellowfin tuna, Thunnus albacares

The International Commission for the Conservation of Atlantic Tuna did not accept the idea of reducing fishing of the Atlantic bluefin, whose populations have been declining for the past few decades from fishing pressure and, who could forget, the BP oil spill fiasco in the Gulf of Mexico. With the bluefin heading towards certain doom, the Center for Biological Diversity in May called for more protection, and invoked the U.S. Endangered Species Act. The decision to not reduce the international catch quotas by the commission means that the survival of the bluefin is riding very heavily on the U.S. Endangered Species Act.

“The international tuna commission had an opportunity to take bluefin tuna off the path to extinction but didn’t. Instead, the commission ignored years of scientific evidence about the perilous decline of bluefin tuna and chose to allow fishing to continue as if nothing is wrong,” commented a staff attorney at the Center, Catherine Kilduff.

Ever since 1969, when the international commission first came into being, the bluefin tuna – which was once very abundant – has been fished almost to the point of being extinct. The commission has set 2011 catch quotas of 12,900 tons, and 1,750 tons for the two different stocks of bluefin tuna: the Mediterranean and eastern Atlantic stock and the western Atlantic stock. The quotas have dipped a little, but not enough. They came down from 13,500 tons and 1,800 tons respectively. That is a step in the right direction, but not enough to help the bluefin regain a toehold in the world.

“This level of fishing pressure sentences bluefin tuna to yet another decade of depletion,” Kilduff explained. “The fishing quotas adopted today bank on overly optimistic conditions for tuna recovery so that fishermen can continue to catch the prized bluefin tuna as they have in past years. As the Gulf of Mexico oil spill shows, bluefin face more threats than just fishing.”

Just when you think things can’t get any weirder, France one ups you… Some activists from Greenpeace have utilized a car with what appears to be a gigantic plastic tuna on top to block off the main entrance to the Agriculture and Fisheries Ministry in France this past Wednesday, to help insight interest in the fact that there has been a steep decline of the Atlantic bluefin tuna populations.

Environmentalists have claimed that the bluefin tuna are being overfished and their populations are in steep decline in both the Eastern Atlantic as well as the Mediterranean. The ICCAT – International Commission for the Conservation of Atlantic Tunas –, which is in charge of regulating trade of the fish on the international markets, is to convene in Paris from the 17th of November until the 27th.

The French branch of Greenpeace is accusing the government of France – much in the “J’Accuse!” style – of placing the wants and needs of the commercial fisheries ahead of the needs and wellbeing of the fish themselves.

The vehicle that these GreenPeace activists so cleverly had dressed up with a big plastic tuna, also bares the message “Save me!”. The tuna was being kept in place by an activist who was laying loosely on top of the car.

People who had business to attend to in the ministry, simply had to use the other entrances.

bluefin tuna

A whale of a tuna was reeled in off Japan, and turned quite a few heads at a fish market in Tokyo on Friday. This was the largest recorded tuna reeled in since 1986, weighing in at 445 kilograms (981 pounds), and sold for 3.2 million yen ($36,700).

“Many of the people who work at the market have never seen a tuna that big,” said a government official from the Tokyo Metropolitan Government, who regulate the Tsukiji fish market. It is interesting to note that the Tsukiji fish market is one of the largest fish markets in the world.

The monstrous tuna, which was auctioned off at 7,200 yen per kilogram, had already had its guts removed and gills cleaned off, which means this whopper of a fish must have weighed more when it was first reeled in off Nagasaki prefecture this week, the official continued.

“It is extremely rare to see a tuna heavier than 400 kilograms,” he said. Yes it is very rare indeed. Tuna generally only reach the 200 kilogram mark, and it is rare to find one of this size.

The largest Japanese caught tuna ever sold at the Tsukiji fish market was a 496 kilogram specimen reeled in in the spring of 1986. However, the largest tuna recorded in the world came from Canada, caught in 1995 weighing in at an astounding 497 kilograms.

There has been a steep decline in global tuna stocks due to overfishing over the past decades. This has caused Western nations to put in a motion for a trade ban on the endangered Atlantic bluefin Tuna.

A new method for distinguishing between tuna species has been presented in a paper co-authored by Dr Jordi Viñas, a fish genetics specialist at Girona University in Spain and Dr Sergi Tudela, Head of Fisheries of WWF Mediterranean.

The new method is based on gene sequencing and the researchers hope that it will support fisheries management and make trade restrictions possible for endangered species of tuna, since it can be used to accurately identify the species from any kind of processed tuna issue. It works for all eight recognized species of tuna, including highly endangered species like the Southern and Pacific bluefin tuna.

The true tunas belong to the genus Thunnus and are among the most endangered of all commercially exploited fish. They are also high priced, so when you pick up some cheap tinned fish in the supermarket the box will rarely contain Thunnus; the content will in most cases have been made from fish belonging to related families such as mackerels.

The Principality of Monaco has already lodged an application before the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) for a trade ban on the endangered Atlantic (Northern) bluefin tuna.

The paper – “A Validated Methodology for Genetic Identification of Tuna

Species (Genus Thunnus)” – was published on October 27 in the journal PLoS ONE.

http://www.plosone.org/

According to Australian Southern Bluefin Tuna Association chief executive Brian Jeffriess, industry experts expect the tuna stocks to have recovered by 2013.

The statement was made during a Korean tuna meeting involving industry representatives from Australia, Japan and New Zeeland.

To make sure that over-catching does not restart, Jeffriess said the Commission for the Conservation of Southern Bluefin Tuna has focussed heavily on new enforcement measures.

“For example, from January 2010, every fish has to be tagged at harvest with each fish having its own individual number,” he said. “This tag would also be backed up by documents for each fish showing the date of harvest, weight and length.”

Yesterday, French president Nicolas Sarkozy announced that France backs Monaco’s call for an international trade ban for Atlantic and Mediterranean bluefin tuna.

“Ours is the last generation with the ability to take action before it’s too late – we must protect marine resources now, in order to fish better in future. We owe this to fishermen, and we owe it to future generations,” said president Sarkozy at the close of a national stakeholder consultation on France’s future sustainable fisheries and maritime policy, the ‘Grenelle de la Mer’.

This means that France joins the growing list of countries and marine experts that wish to place Bluefin tuna under the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) to give the populations a chance to recuperate.

“WWF welcomes the Monaco initiative and the position of France, whose fleets have traditionally caught more bluefin tuna than any other country,” said Dr Sergi Tudela, Head of Fisheries at WWF Mediterranean.

The Principality of Monaco was the first state to announce its willingness to sponsor a proposal to ban international trade in Bluefin tuna and the country is now seeking the support of other states in whose waters this species lives.

“In terms of eligibility for a listing on CITES Appendix I, Atlantic bluefin tuna ticks every box – and then some,” said Dr Susan Lieberman, Director of WWF’s Global Species Programme.

The next CITES conference will be held next year in Qatar, but proposals have to be submitted by 17 October to be eligible for consideration.

A Japanese team of scientists are now announcing that they are close to completing genome sequencing of the Bluefin tuna. Once they have reached this goal, their next project will be to use their knowledge to create a tuna breeding program for a new type of tuna specially designed for aquacultures.

The wild tuna populations have become severely depleted due to overfishing and the WWF has warned that the Atlantic Bluefin tuna will be eradicated within three years unless radical measures are taken to safeguard remaining specimens.

“We have already completed two computer sequencing runs and have around 60 per cent of the tuna genome,” says Dr. Kazumasa Ikuta, director of research at the Yokohama-based Fisheries Research Agency. “We expect to have the entire sequence in the next couple of months. We plan to use the sequence to establish a breeding programme for bluefin tuna as most aquaculture farmers presently use wild juveniles. We want to establish a complete aquaculture system that will produce fish that have good strength, are resistant to disease, grow quickly and taste delicious.”

The genome sequencing is the result of the collaborative efforts of scientists from Japan’s Fisheries Research Agency, Kyushu University, and The University of Tokyo.

Indonesia is getting ready to sink foreign boats carrying out illegal fishing in Indonesian waters.

“We are glad the House`s Commission IV supports us in this,” Marine Resources and Fisheries Minister Freddy Numbery said at a meeting with the House commission this week.

Numbery says firm action is needed to deter foreign boats from continuing to poach, and that his office and the parliament were currently revising the law on marine resources with regard to dealing with crimes in the seas.

Elviana, a member of Commission IV, agreed with the minister and said that firm actions needed to be implemented immediately to deter foreign parties intending to steal fish from Indonesian waters.

“Tuna fish sells well so that many foreign fishermen are venturing into the country’s waters“, she said. “This must not be allowed to continue.”

Earlier, Indonesian authorities have seized illegal fishing boats and auctioned them out, but this system seems to have been ineffective.

“It is believed auctions have been arranged to ensure that the boats can be sold to their owners who are also the suspects,” Elviana said, adding that illegal boats such as from Thailand still continued operating in a great number.

The Turkish government has set their own very high catch limit for endangered Mediterranean bluefin tuna without showing any regard for internationally agreed quotas and the survival of this already severally overfished species. By telling the Turkish fishermen to conduct this type of overfishing, the Turkish government is effectively killing the future of this important domestic industry.

Turkey currently operates the largest Mediterranean fleet fishing for bluefin tuna, a commercially important species that – if properly managed – could continue to create jobs and support fishermen in the region for years and years to come. Mediterranean societies have a long tradition of fishing and eating bluefin tuna and this species was for instance an appreciated food fish in ancient Rome. Today, rampant overfishing is threatening to make the Mediterranean bluefin tuna a thing of the past.

Management of bluefin tuna is entrusted to the International Commission for the Conservation of Atlantic Tunas (ICCAT), an intergovernmental organisation. Last year, the Turkish government objected to the Bluefin tuna quota that was agreed upon at the ICCAT meeting in November and is now ignoring it completely.

The agreed tuna quota is accompanied by a minimum legal landing size set at 30 kg to make it possible for the fish to go through at least one reproductive cycle before it is removed from the sea, but this important limit is being widely neglected as well. Catches below the 30 kg mark have recently been reported by both Turkish and Italian media.

To make things even worse, Mediterranean fishermen are also involved in substantial illegal catching and selling of Mediterranean bluefin tuna. This year’s tuna fishing season has just begun and Turkish fishermen have already got caught red-handed while landing over five tonnes of juvenile bluefin tuna in Karaburun.

According to scientific estimations, Mediterranean blue fin tuna fishing must be kept at 15,000 tonnes a year and the spawning grounds must be protected during May and June if this species shall have any chance of avoiding extinction in the Mediterranean. This contrasts sharply against the actual hauls of 61,100 tonnes in 2007, a number which is over four times the recommended level and twice the internationally agreed quota. The crucial spawning grounds are also being ravished by industrial fishing fleets.

By blatantly ignoring international quota limits, the Turkish government is in fact threatening not only the tuna but also the future livelihood of numerous Mediterranean fishermen, including the Turkish ones.