Keep more fish in the oceans

OPINION:

This Sunday is Father’s Day. While most of the country might be celebrating with baseball and burgers, I’m taking a decidedly different approach: I’m going “fishing.” But not the kind of fishing you’re thinking of.

Our planet’s oceans and waterways are being stripped through commercial fishing. Even “recreational fishing” takes its toll on the environment, not to mention the trauma it does to marine life. At our current rate we could see fishless oceans by 2048.

This is why, as an ethical vegan and father of two children, I have my own unique approach to “fishing.” Armed with Google image search and fish identification guides, my kids and I go “fishing” in the same way a birder goes birding. We walk the shorelines and countless docks of New York’s Finger Lakes region and “catch” a glimpse of freshwater fish. This past weekend we “caught” a dozen carp, a few bass, several perch and one very elusive catfish. All were logged in our fishing journal.

As stewards of this planet, we have a unique opportunity to share these moments and nature with the next generation and prove there are more ethical ways to “capture” wildlife.

ERIC C. LINDSTROM

Executive director

Farm Animal Rights Movement

Bethesda, Md.