20 to 30 Tons of Reef Fish Killed Daily

Encerradores during the early years of this technique, around 2000-2005 cleaned out most of the reefs between La Paz and Loreto. There were up to 40 boats working. They would put their nets around the edge of the rocky reefs along the shore line and then drive fish into them by banging iron rebar onto the rocks and banging their oars on the bottom of the panga. In the early years each boat was getting about 1000 to 1500 kilos (1 to 1.5 tons) of reef fish each day. The practice while totally illegal was never prosecuted. The same boat with a different crew would work at night with pistoleros aboard taking about the same quantity of fish at night with harpoons. One boat with 4 divers and two compressor men in the panga (6 people total) were getting around  2000 to 3000 Kilos (2 tons to 3 tons of fish) in a 24 hour period. These boats are still working in the national park at Espiritu Santo Island outside La Paz and while the catch is much smaller over 90% of the reef fish are gone in the areas where they still work.

June 17, 2015

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This is one of Scott's most popular sculptures and and sold in major galleries for $7200.00. Read More...

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Espíritu Santo es parte de ti (Espiritu Santo is dart of you) is a grassroots campaign working to raise public awareness and advocacy, promote community pride and best practices and eradicate illegal fishing in Espiritu Santo National Park, in particular parrotfish, a reef grazing species that is critical to the maintenance of healthy reefs. Vibrant, healthy reefs cannot survive without grazers Read More...

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Espiritu Santo es parte de ti
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See This Recent Video and Act Today

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