It's probably not news to anyone that the oceans are being overfished in mankind's usual parasitic overuse of earth's resources, but just how much of an impact we are making often goes unrealized. As part of a 10-year census of marine life, a group of oceanography students reviewed thousands of food menus and fishing logs dating back to the 1850s to help scientists determine what the oceans were like more than a century ago. What the results show is not only an issue with abundance of supply, but just how deeply we have effected the world marine ecology overall.

The menu project found, for example, that there was nothing special about catching a 20 or 30 pound lobster off Nova Scotia or Maine 100 years ago - lobsters eaten today are typically about one to two pounds. Likewise, it was not uncommon for fishermen to catch 300-pound halibut at the turn of the century as well, whereas today it is commercially extinct. By understanding what the oceans were like long ago, researchers hope to understand what needs to be done to restore fish habitats or replenish fish stocks. The census shows not all of the oceanic problems can be blamed just on overfishing however - humanity's effects on marine habitats are also part of the problem, which kind of figures - if it's not the overfishing, it's something else humanity has done to rape the planet.

Paul Holm, a Danish environmental researcher who leads the project on the history of marine animals said, "Even if we have a moratorium on fishing in many parts of the world, the fish stocks will not be able to replenish, simply because we have destroyed the breeding grounds."

Hope is not entirely lost however - the United Nations has promised to restore some marine ecosystems and their fisheries to their former levels by 2020, and this project will help achieve that goal. I'm somewhat sceptical though - it will take a lot more than a few marine reserves to turn the tide on the destruction of the marine ecology, and 20 to 30 pound lobsters dont suddenly become abundant in just 15 years - it takes much longer than that for a lobster to even grow to that size - estimates say a lifespan of 100 to 125 years for east coast lobsters are possible. How does the UN hope to achieve that in just 15 years I wonder?

With the world population continuing to grow exponentially, there simply wont be enough resources on this planet to support everyone, no matter what we do. Perhaps issues like global warming and marine ecology aren't acted upon as much as they should be because, unless drastic changes are made in the way we live, it's unlikely humanity will survive far enough into the future that it will matter. What those changes are, I don't know. We certainly need to stop reproducing like rabbits, or should I say parasites, if we are to have a chance of long-term survival on earth.

Acknowledgements: research news from CBC Health & Science News, fish image from TVNZ.