Bottom trawl fishing destroys vast expanses of complex seafloor habitat off Alaksa's coastline.
Oceana North America reports that bottom trawl fishing is banned in about 180,000 square miles of the Bering Sea around Alaska's Aleutian Islands as of July, 2008. (reference 3) In 2009, the North Pacific Fishery Management Council banned industrial fishing in U.S. waters north of the Bering Strait. (reference 3) The Marine Conservation Biology Institute (MCBI) reports that bottom trawling, "damages and destroys structurally complex habitats," including recently discovered deep sea coral beds, fish and sponge habitats and geological structures on the seafloor. (reference 1,2)
Deep Sea Coral Damage
Bottom trawl fishing is banned on about 180,000 square miles of the Bering Sea around Alaska.
The Alaska Oceans Program (AOP) reports that a Gulf of Alaska research trawl in 1990 removed 2000 pounds of corals from the seafloor. About 27 percent of corals in the path of the trawling net were detached from the seabed. Seven years later, the damaged coral beds had not yet been repopulated with young corals. (reference 1) In 2002, Bob Stone and Jon Heifetz of the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) discovered that heavily trawled areas on the bottom of the Bering Sea revealed destroyed corals and areas devoid of corals entirely. (reference 1) A host of other studies over the past 12 years confirm a correlation between significant coral reduction and extensive bottom trawl fishing in areas around Alaska. (resource 1, reference 1)
Impacts on Biodiversity
The huge dragnets used for bottom trawling scrape the seafloor clean of coral and sponges and negatively impact the life support networks of every species in the immediate and surrounding areas. AOP reports that a single trawl in the Gulf of Alaska damages over half of the vase sponges and sea whips in its wake. The trawl also destroys 20 percent of brittle stars and 13 percent of finger sponges in just one pass over the ocean floor. (Reference 1) MCBI reports that bottom trawling in the Bering Sea reduces the complexity of ocean habitat and has the potential to permanently alter the types and amounts of species dependent upon complex seafloor structures. (reference 2)
Bycatch Issues
One of the largest destructive elements of bottom trawl fishing off the coast of Alaska consists of massive bycatch of non-targeted species. Fishing companies aim for specific animals such as, shrimp, crab, cod, orange roughy, snappers, mackeral, pollock and rockfish. (reference 4) However, AOP reports that up to 17 pounds or more of non-targeted species including corals, sponges, and chinook salmon get caught in the net for every one pound of the targeted marketable species. (reference 1) Save Corals reports that over a million pounds of Alaskan corals and sponges are caught up in dragnets as bycatch each year. (reference 5)
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