How does illegal fishing affect the environment?

Answer 1

Overfishing can effect a human because .... the fishermen or fisher lady ... have to stay awake all night and day to ... prepare to catch a fish .... this can mean they can get cranky and can smell for days ... because they are too tired to do anything ... they just care about going fishing again.......... THIS IS ALL TRUE BTW. xx

Over fishing affects us by using up all the fish that some need to survive or that we humans just use for different reasons

Answer 2

Fishing regulations are set up for several reasons:

• to protect fish during breeding seasons
• to ensure that only fish of a legal size (mature fish) are taken
• to protect endangered fish species
• to maintain the size of breeding fish populations
• to maintain the balance an ecology between desirable and undesirable fish

Failing to follow these guides can:

• reduce the number of fish leading to extinction
• change the dynamics of the ecosystem leading to an increase in "trash" fish and a reduction in the number of desirable fish
• eliminate food fish leading to extinction of desirable fish
• reduce predator fish leading to over production of undesirable fish
• remove breeding fish from the population leading to extinction.
• Cause a reduction in food sources for marine mammals and birds leading to a depletion of their numbers

Overfishing puts a species in a position where the surviving fish cannot reproduce quickly enough to be able to replace the fish taken.

A trawler pulling a net along the sea bottom removes up to 25% of the seabed life in that area with each sweep. So it's not just the target fish that are being caught in the net, other species of fish and marine animals are also caught in these nets.

The bottlenose dolphin in the Mediterraneon Sea has seen a 60% population decrease because of overfishing of sardines and anchovies. Overfishing of herring around Rost Island in Norway has caused the starvation of many puffin chicks, with a population decrease possibly as high as 60%, as their parents cannot find enough food for them. These are just two of many species affected by overfishing.

While fish farms are seen by many as a solution, some of the food for farm stock fish is wild caught fish. This is not really a solution as it takes prey fish out of the ocean food chain.