Today’s topic is a reflection on a number of the books that I’ve been reading over the past few months (and some even further back) that I have yet to review and how they all tie together. I figured you can go to Amazon for a book review, but where else can you get a discussion of these books all together? As you can tell from the title, there’s an ocean theme to them. Unfortunately, anyone who loves the ocean cannot ignore the fact that the ocean, everything in it, and everything that relies on it, are in great peril.

As someone who loves eating fish and particularly sushi, I’m often torn between my palette and my conscience. So, when I read “The Story of Sushi” by Trevor Corson (“The Secret Life of Lobsters“), I drooled over the descriptions of the toro (the fattiest, tastiest, most expensive part of a tuna) while feeling incredibly guilty about the fact that it often comes from the bluefin tuna, one of the world’s most endangered fish. In Carl Safina’s (“Eye of the Albatross” and “Voyage of the Turtle“) masterpiece, “Song for the Blue Ocean“, he outlines the enormous challenges of protecting an animal that most people would rather see on their dinner plate (often for over $10 a bite) than in the ocean. While Corson does discuss the environmental concerns of eating some types of fish, it is not the focus of his book, which follows the progress of a class of students training to become sushi chefs. Corsons’s style of switching seemlessly between the present day story and the history / science of sushi makes it a fun read that has me excited about sitting at the sushi bar and ordering “omakase” (chef’s choice) to get the freshest fish available. But…

… Safina’s book also reminds me that consumers vote with their wallets (and Americans have big wallets, globally speaking), and eating toro and other catches from poorly-managed fisheries is a vote to allow irresponsible overfishing (and high levels of by-catch, such as in the shrimp fishery) to continue. However, nowhere is this all more challenging of an issue than in developing nations, where people are just trying to make a living day-to-day and cannot be concerned with longterm sustainability of a population. In “The Sex Lives of Cannibals” by J. Maarten Troost, the author and his wife spend two years living in Tarawa, an equatorial atoll that is the most densly populated island in the Pacific nation of Kirabati. He describes, rather humorously but often depressingly, what it’s like to live in a place that has become overpopulated, slightly westernized, and almost totally dependent on imports. After reading about the huge environmental and economic challenges facing the people of Tarawa, and how their country has oversold their fishing rights to wealthy fish-hungry nations (harming their own local fishermen), I am further convinced that the people who depend on the oceans for their immediate livelihood are in deep, deep trouble.

There are things we can do though, and there is reason for hope. As I said before, we vote with our wallets. When we buy fish, we should know if that species is in trouble, where it was caught, and HOW it was caught (long line, farm-raised, etc.). If we don’t buy an item when we disapprove of how it made it from the wild to our grocery store, then we can make a difference. (Learn more about responsible seafood consumption.) For example, some fish, like mahi mahi (also known as dorado or dolphin fish) are safe to eat when caught in certain regions of the world. (In “Adrift” by Steven Callahan, an amazing story of being lost at sea for 76 days, Callahan caught several of these big, tasty fish and saw them around his boat all the time. Good luck doing the same with bluefin or other highly prized fish.)

Another big example of a time we can vote with our wallets is when buying fish for aquariums. Safina describes horrendous practices used in many poor nations of using cyanide to knock out beautiful reef fish so they can be caught. As you’d guess, tons of fish die for the very few that survive to reach your tank (and many of those will die from delayed effects of poisoning soon after you bring them home from the store). And just as bad, the cyanide kills the reef where the fish were living. Coral reefs are the lifeblood of the coastal oceans and they are disappearing rapidly for a host of reasons I won’t go into (ocean warming and acidification, erosion, etc.). So, if you buy aquarium fish, find out where they’re from and how they were caught. If you don’t like the answer, or don’t get one, then tell the vendor why you won’t buy from them. They’ll listen, they just lost a sale.

One more example of voting for the ocean with your wallet might seem unrelated, but it isn’t: wood and wood products. “Song for the Blue Ocean” provides a thorough investigation and history of the salmon fisheries of the Pacific northwest. Proving that he can write brilliantly about anything, not just the ocean, Safina had me fascinated (and outraged) by the problems the timber industry has inflicted on the poor salmon. The clear-cutting of forests (including monstrous trees that are hundreds or thousands of years old) causes erosion, flooding, and warming of waters in the rivers that snake from the mountains down to the oceans. The salmon, who must swim up these rivers to lay their eggs (their last act on Earth, as it requires all their energy reserves to accomplish), are thus thwarted in their millenia-old pilgramige inland. And of course damming rivers creates an unnaturable, ofter impenetrable hurdle for these fish whose evolutionary flaw is that they need to coexist with us in “our” rivers. So, think about the wood and furniture you purchase and whether your new coffee table really needs to be made from a tree that had shaded a salmon stream for over a thousand years when the Declaration of Independence was signed.

We must embrace the oceans and those of us who already do must help show everyone why they are critical for human survival (which is of course relevant whether you live in Kauai, Kirabiti, or Kansas). If you enjoy the ocean, whether as a surfer, sailor, beach-goer, or fisherman, you have a responsibility to protect it. Join ocean-focused non-profit organizations like the Surfrider Foundation, petitiion your elected officials for the changes you want, and vote with your wallet. Don’t be too timid to ask questions about what you purchase and say “no” when you don’t get an anwer or don’t like what you hear. So, “Be the change you want to see in the world” (a great quote by Mahatma Gandhi, who many people don’t know was a lifelong surfer… ok, I made that up, but I love the quote).