Ocean Dwelling Tuna Fishing

Sunday, 25 March 2007

Tuna Fishes are one of the fast swimmers inhabiting in the waters. Tunas being ocean dwelling fishes belong to the family of Scombridae where mackerels and bonitos are also part of. Scrombids are generally predators of the open ocean and are capable of considerable speed as characterized by tunas. Scrombids, in addition, have two dorsal fins and a series of finlets between the read dorsal fin and behind the anal fin, these characteristics are the ones responsible in the ability of the tuna fishes to swim faster.

The tuna fishes normally have pinkish and reddish flesh. The explanation is being attributed to the great content of myoglobin on the muscle tissues of the tuna. The tuna fishes are generally warm-blooded. As warm-blooded animals they are required to maintain the thermal homeostasis; that is, they keep their core body temperature at a nearly constant level regardless of the temperature of the surrounding environment. This can involve not only the ability to generate heat, but also the ability to cool down. Warm-blooded animals mainly control their body temperature by regulating their metabolic rates (e.g. increasing their metabolic rate as the surrounding temperature begins to decrease).

One thing that is quite interesting about tuna fishes is their likeness to associate with the dolphins. They are usually being seen swimming along side the equally fast swimmers, the dolphins. This being “playful” of the tuna fishes to the dolphins sparked a fishing issue because most often that not, when fisherman hunts tuna fishes, they also capture dolphins. This has brought attention to some conservationists. Several methods of tuna fishing were devised to ensure that tuna fishing become “dolphin friendly” as the dolphins are not supposed to be hunted. Nevertheless, the theories of tuna fishing were as good as just theories. There is, no currently, an inspecting team that oversees the tuna fish hunters are not really harming or capturing the dolphins alongside the tuna fishes.

The methods of capturing tuna fishes described below are supposed to be performed in order to ensure that dolphins are safe. For reference, you may want to read on:

· The Almadabra method is catching tuna fishes using an elaborate and old Arabic technique of using nets in towards deep waters going to progressively smaller pools.

· Big-game fishing, sometimes called offshore sport fishing or offshore game fishing, is a form of recreational fishing, targeting large bony fish such as tuna and marlin in the open sea, often some distance from land and, in some fishing grounds, out of sight of land. It is conducted recreationally, as well as in competitions.

· Long-line fishing is a commercial fishing technique that uses hundreds or even thousands of baited hooks hanging from a single line. Swordfish, tuna, halibut, sablefish and Patagonian toothfish are commonly caught by this method.

At present, due to the massive consumption of tuna fishes as demanded by the buying public, tuna fishes are decreasing in numbers. Just recently, Japan has exceeded the limit of captured bluefin tuna to over 12,000 to 20,000 tons whereas the limit is set to only 6,000 tons per year.

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