Parrotfish Still Targeted by Pistoleros

There are almost no parrotfish left on Espiritu Santo Island due to illegal fishing by pistoleros and encerradores and legal spearfishing by freedivers. See the video below to better understand the damage being done by Pistolero’s and Encerradores. The people in La Paz will need to decide whether the value of eating parrotfish is worth destroying the reefs and ecosystem at Espiritu Santo Island and the Bay of La Paz.

While there is no law against commercially catching and selling parrotfish, there is no legal way to catch them. They are shot illegally at night by pistolero’s or caught by encerradores putting nets on reefs. 

A Quote from Carl Safina’s book "The View from Lazy Point"

“After they pretty much fished out groupers and snappers,” Bob says, “people started targeting parrotfish.””But parrotfish turn out to be really important for reefs. Parrotfish’s fused teeth make them uniquely capable of scraping seaweed. “There was absolutely nothing else like them until the Eocene, which started about fifty-five million years ago,” Bob says. There still isn’t. Surgeonfish graze seaweed too but they nip it; parrotfish really scrape it away. Fossilized reefs show that before parrotfish, reefs were moundlike and dominated by seaweed. When parrotfish evolved, modern reefs appeared. They’ve been scraping seaweeds from reefs ever since. Without parrotfish, reefs would likely again become moundlike and dominated by seaweed”

We all know by now how many reef fish we are finding in the markets, especially parrotfish.  They can be sold legally but it is interesting that these fish are not caught legally. They are caught on reefs with nets (encerradores) or shot at night (pistolero’s). Both methods are now illegal.

Some thoughts on how to stop killing the fish that scrape clean the reefs of alge and dirt, allowing the soft corrals to return.  40 years ago the points off Espiritu Santo Island looked more like this video taken near La Paz where this undived unknown reef still has lots of parrot fish, surgeon fish, and pargo. All unafraid as they haven’t been shot at by spearfishermen. These fish work hard to clean reefs and soft corals.

 

Some thoughts on how to involve the public in stopping the killing, selling and eating of these critical reef fish.

1. Continue and increase nighttime patrols to stop the illegal capture of these fish.

2. Put the sellers of these critical fish on notice that by selling this fish they are dooming the reefs of Espiritu Santo to lose all their soft corals and become just dirty rocks. For example, take a group of young students  into the fish market or better yet Wal-Mart fish counter. In front of the TV crew tell the children how important parrot fish are to the reef ecosystem and have the children ask the mostrador/owner to stop selling these critically important reef fish. It’s their reefs being destroyed.

3. Ask the townspeople to stop buying these critical illegally caught fish. I’m sure there are a variety of ways to do this, newspaper, TV, radio, posters in the market. Get written commitments from fish markets and certify them with some sort of seal they put on their fish display counter

4. Here is a type of add that  would be effective in asking people to stop buying and eating parrot fish.  https://www.facebook.com/lilesdav/videos/10205576985171221/

5. Media campaign to convince the public in La Paz that the environmental cost of eating illegally caught parrot fish is too high.

July 29, 2015

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