I just returned from three weeks in China, investigating poaching and the effects of 1.4 billion people on land and wildlife. With four times the population of America and several thousand more years of occupation, China has altered severely most of its natural world.
China loves its fish, almost embracing to death many of their 709 freshwater species and 64 ocean-to-river migrating ones. Waters that had wild fish prior to the Communist revolution were depleted by economic policies that ignored environmental concerns, allowing massive dam building, land reclamation, industrial pollution, and overfishing. The catastrophic environmental effects of those policies may be irreversible.
Having ravaged their own wild populations, they currently venture far in international waters to harvest annually four times as much seafood as second-highest producer America does. But that enormous haul is insufficient to satisfy their fish-demanding population.
To their credit, they have reduced the size of their fishing fleet by thousands of vessels, closed critical waters during spawning season, and invested more heavily than any other country in aquaculture. That new artificial fishery now employs about 14 million, many of whom were coerced to leave their boats to learn fish farming. China has converted and now maintains tens of thousands of ponds, lakes, paddies and rivers producing about two-thirds of the world’s aquaculture.
As a result, countless restaurants and markets sell fish fresher than we buy in our own markets — fish still swimming in an aquarium, bucket or box. Silver, bighead, black, grass, common and crucian carp predominate, but you’ll find alongside them bream, Reeve’s shad, eel, toad catfish, whitebait, mullet, perch, tilapia, roach, rainbow trout, silver salmon, paddle fish, pike and sturgeon, along with freshwater shrimp, river crabs, mussels, clams, snails and edible aquatic plants like lotus and water chestnuts.
Most of the fish they raise are very bony and prepared chopped up and not filleted — a feature that doesn’t seem to bother anyone here. But I found myself spitting out bones with every bite and yearning for a big American fillet.
During my investigation, I took a break to go fishing, using birds instead of rods and reels. Here, cormorant fishermen for over a thousand years have trained their fish-eating birds to dive around their boats, catch and reluctantly disgorge their catch. A ring or noose around their necks is just tight enough to prevent the birds from swallowing big fish, which are scooped up with a long-handled dip net along with the string-leashed, highly motivated cormorant, which is kept hungry and rewarded with tiny morsels it can swallow.
I fished successfully with them twice, both day and later at night with lights, which attracted fish to the surface. Able to swim up to 38 mph under water, they are fish-killing machines. They brought in numerous carp up to 2 pounds for us. Though cormorant fishing was practiced in Greece and Macedonia — and in England and France in the 16th and 17th centuries — it never took a permanent hold in the latter countries or in America, as fishermen could catch far more fish using other methods.
I also fished again alongside anglers who used very long 10-foot rods without reels. Using up to three rod holders and seated in portable chairs, they plunked their baited hooks into still water, waiting for a bite like anglers all over the world. What was different was their bait — and what they caught.
Secret recipes made of fishy-smelling dough predominated while a few fishermen used tiny brine shrimp. The angler having the most action proudly displayed his catch to me — about two dozen minnow-sized fish, trophies of the table that he would take home to stir-fry and eat in their entirety, bones and all. There were no big fish left here.
I left China wondering what they’d think about the 500,000 trout, most over a foot long, being stocked this spring in Massachusetts’ waters. And I wondered about America’s wildlife enduring an ever-expanding population dependent on ceaseless economic growth and development.
China provides a great lesson. We need to work vigilantly to protect and save our natural heritage at every opportunity before it’s gone.
Central waters stocked
Central District towns stocked this week included, Ashburnham: Phillips Brook, Whitman River; Athol: Ellinwood Brook, Miller’s River, Tully River, West Brook; Charlton: Snows Pond; Fitchburg: Fallulah Brook, Phillips Brook; Grafton: Quinsigamond River; Hardwick: Moose Brook; Holden: Asnebumskit Brook, Trout Brook, Quinapoxet River; Hopedale: Hopedale Pond; Hubbardston: Canesto Brook, Joslin Brook, Natty Pond Brook, West Branch Ware River; Leominster: Barretts Pond, Crow Hill Pond; Northboro: Assabet River; Oakham: Parker Brook.
Also, Orange: Tully Brook; Oxford: Carbuncle Pond, French River; Petersham: West Branch Fever Brook; Princeton: Justice Brook, Keyes Brook, Stillwater River; Royalston: Lawrence Brook, Miller’s River, Scott Brook; Sterling: Stillwater River, West Wauschacum Pond; Templeton: Otter River; Westminster: Phillips Brook, Wyman Pond Brook; Winchendon: Dennison Lake, Miller’s River, Priest Brook, Tanbell Brook; Worcester: Lake Quinsigamond.
Calendar
◼Today-Oct 31 — Worcester Surf Casting Club season-long Striper & Blue Derby. Canal-only Derby: today through Sept. 30. Info: Larry “Chich” Titta, (508) 799-5826.
Today-Sunday — U.S. Open Bowfishing Championship for habitat degrading invasive species of carp, gar, and buffalo. $10,000 first prize and Tracker 1860 bowfishing boat. Info: www.basspro.com/usopen.
Saturday — Vintage Plug Swap and Sell. Saltwater Lure Collectors Club, free. Trowbridge Tavern, Bourne. 8 a.m. to 2 p.m.. Info: www.swlcc.com/SHOW.html.
Saturday — Rotary Fishing Flea Market, All Saints Episcopal Church, 10 Billerica Road, Chelmsford. 7 a.m. to noon. Info: gaffed2001@yahoo.com“>gaffed2001@yahoo.com.
Saturday — Leicester Rod & Gun sporting clays, every Saturday, 10 a.m. Fifty clay birds, $10.
Saturday-Sunday — Blackpowder Shoot and Pow-Wow, Auburn Sportsman’s Club. Info: Art Lessard.
Sunday — Annual Trout Derby, Gardner Fish and Gun Club. 538 Clark St, Gardner, 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. Sixty stocked trout and $100 prize for “Mr. & Mrs. Fish and Gun Trout.” Cost: $7 adults and $4 children. Info: Bill Shea, (978) 844-3620.
Sunday — 3-D Safari League, Century Sportsman’s Club, Auburn, 7 a.m. to noon.
Sunday — Quabbin Birding trip, Forbush Bird Club. Meet at Gate 35 at the end of Old North Dana Road off Route 122 in New Salem, 7 a.m., free. Leader: Tom Pirro, (978) 874-5212, tpirro2010@gmail.com“>tpirro2010@gmail.com.
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