Randy Olson, Melissa Farlow Photography

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  • This is the Ust Bolsheretsk area at the height of fishing season along the Bolshaya river.  These fishing brigades use tractors to tow one end of the net and then bring it around full circle in the river to cinch in the fish. The net is then dumped into small boats that have nets laid in them that the crane uses to pick them up and dump them into trucks that go to the processing plants in Ust Bolsheretsk.  This brigade is working in this area that is south of Oktyabrski.
    MM7593_20080805_04281.tif
  • A hand made boat outside Selicho fishing village on Lake Turkana, Kenya. The Dasenech thought fishing was a poor man's activity thru out their history, but with the droughts and difficulties with pastoralism in this area... more and more are turning to fishing. Some of the fish caught are salted and packed onto trucks to DR Congo.
    MM8259_20140429_36338.tif
  • A fish tangled in a net on board a fishing vessel off of the Vetmannaeyjar Islands, an archipelago of 15 islands and 30 rock stacks off the South Coast of Iceland.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7393_1057894.JPG
  • A fishing brigade on the Bolshaya River south of the town of Oktyabrski where men make a fish camp out of a beached, ocean-going vessel.  They are not fishing on this day because it allows time for the fish to spawn, and indigenous communities up river in Kamchatka can fish in the area along the Bolshaya River. <br />
<br />
Fishing brigades use tractors to tow one end of a net and then bring it around full circle in the river to capture the fish. A net is  dumped into small boats that have small nets laid in them. A crane picks up the small nets and dumps them into trucks that take the fish to the processing plants in Ust Bolsheretsk. If fishing was allowed every day in the mouths of these rivers just off the Kamchatka shelf, no salmon would get up river to spawn. There are two “passing days” each week when fishing is banned, so these fishermen hang out in their camp and do their laundry. Some fishermen come from as far as Ulan-Ude, which is on the border with Siberia. One of the fishermen in this photo is from PK, two are from Urilutsk, Siberia, and two are from Oktybrski.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7593_1248226.TIF
  • A hand made boat outside Selicho fishing village on Lake Turkana, Kenya. The Dasenech thought fishing was a poor man's activity thru out their history, but with the droughts and difficulties with pastoralism in this area... more and more are turning to fishing. Some of the fish caught are salted and packed onto trucks to DR Congo.
    MM8259_20140430_36488.tif
  • .A dog watches over as Russian fishermen pull in the nets from a fishing brigade on the Bolshaya River. Strict work hours at the mouth of the river allow some of the salmon can pass through to Kanchatka’s indigenous camps further upstream. <br />
<br />
The fish have gone into a dormant state because they have been in the net so long. This was the first great push of salmon—the storm had just passed, the tide was out and the water had cleared enough that all salmon make a mad dash upriver.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7593_1260950.TIF
  • A fishing brigade on the Bolshaya River.<br />
Russian boats are so loaded with fish that they barely clear the surface of the water. These fishermen are fighting against time while the tide is out. When the ocean tide is high and coming in to the Bolshaya, it pushes their nets closed.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7593_1260922.JPG
  • Fishing off of the Vetmannaeyjar Islands, an archipelago of 15 islands and 30 rock stacks off the South Coast of Iceland.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7393_1057893.JPG
  • Workers pull a net with salmon at a fishing brigade on the Bolshaya River.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7593_1260949.JPG
  • A Koryak man dries fish in his summer camp that will feed his family through the winter. Koryaks are an indigenous people of Kamchatka Krai in the Russian Far East, who inhabit the coastlands of the Bering Sea to the south of the Anadyr basin and the country to the immediate north of the Kamchatka Peninsula. The koryak are typically split into two groups. The coastal people Nemelan (or Nymylan) meaning ‘village dwellers’ due to their sedentary fishing habits and the inland Koryaks, reindeer herders called Chauchen (or Chauchven) meaning ‘rich in reindeer’ who are more nomadic.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7593_1260943.TIF
  • Father and daughter share a tender moment on their boat which is home for the family during fishing season off the coast of Prince of Wales Island in Alaska’s Southeast. When not the fishing for salmon, the family lives on nearby Marble Island and the children are home schooled.<br />
Alaska’s largest and most valuable fisheries target salmon, pollock, crab, herring, halibut, shrimp, sablefish, and Pacific cod.<br />
The total value of Alaska’s commercial fisheries is $1.5 billion for the fishermen, with a wholesale value of $3.6 billion. Economists estimate the commercial seafood industry contributes $5.8 billion and 78,500 jobs to the Alaskan economy. Fisheries management in Alaska is based on scientific assessments and monitoring of harvested populations and is regarded as a model of successful natural resource stewardship.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM7258_1075082.TIF
  • Hauling in salmon from their boats at a fishing camp, coastal people called Nymylan are village dwellers and hang the catch to dry on racks for winter.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7593_1260946.TIF
  • A fisherman hauls in salmon at a fishing camp.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7593_1260945.JPG
  • Rifat Pinarbas readies his nets on the family fishing boat.
    RANDY OLSON_MM6879_708204.TIF
  • A boat driver's daughter helps fishermen at a salmon fishing camp.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7593_1260912.JPG
  • Searching for salmon in a fishing camp where waters reveal a bear carcass.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7593_1260944.TIF
  • A salmon swims away from a brown bear that is fishing for salmon in Kuril Lake.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7593_1260983-2.TIF
  • A brown bear fishing for salmon leaps into Kuril Lake while her cubs wait on the shore. Kamchatka has the highest density of brown bears in the world, with almost 15,000 on the Russian peninsula.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7593_1260983-1.TIF
  • Salmon peek out from containers where caviar is produced in a fishing plant.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7593_1260951.JPG
  • Underwater photo of a brown bear fishing for salmon in Kuril Lake.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7593_1260983-15.TIF
  • A commercial fishing boat loaded with nets departs in calm waters through Frederick Sound in Southeast Alaska.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM7258_1075095.jpg
  • A brown bear fishing for salmon in Kuril Lake. Bears need to eat about 40 fish a day to put on weight to make it through the winter.<br />
<br />
Brown bears in Kamchatka can be 7 to 9 feet in length and weigh 700-800 pounds. Species: U. arctic Genus:Ursus<br />
<br />
Kamchatka has the highest density of grizzly bears in the world, with almost 15,000 on the Russian peninsula.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7593_1260959.JPG
  • Ocean spray on a fishing boar off of the Vetmannaeyjar Islands, an archipelago of 15 islands and 30 rock stacks off the South Coast of Iceland.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7393_1058060.JPG
  • Brown bears fishing for salmon in Kuril Lake. Kurilskoe Lake Preserve is a world heritage site and had serious poaching. But now, two or three wardens are always out on enforcement and they pack out for a month at a time. The official salary for wardens is $200 a month, but the WWF came in and supplemented salaries and bought them the equipment they need to do the job. WWF decided one of the gems of the reserve system that exists in all of Russia should be poaching free - and that also protects the brown bears.
    MM7593_20080818_07671.tif
  • Chinese workers gather to talk on a fishing boat at port of Zhapo.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7393_1057995.JPG
  • A brown bear fishing for salmon in icy waters of Kuril Lake. Kamchatka has the highest density of brown bears, also known as grizzly bears, in the world. There are almost 15,000 on the Russian peninsula.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7593_1260960.TIF
  • Salmon on deck of fishing boat.
    MELISSA FARLOW_RF4115_1114647.jpg
  • Fishing near Sitka Sound on Baranof Island.
    MELISSA FARLOW_RF4115_1114661.jpg
  • Brown bears fishing for salmon in Kuril Lake. Kurilskoe Lake Preserve is a world heritage site and had serious poaching. But now, two or three wardens are always out on enforcement and they pack out for a month at a time.  The official salary for wardens is $200 a month, but the WWF came in and supplemented salaries and bought them the equipment they need to do the job. WWF decided one of the gems of the reserve system that exists in all of Russia should be poaching free - and that also protects the brown bears.
    MM7593_20080813_06845.tif
  • Men and a boy fishing on Thorne Bay.
    MELISSA FARLOW_RF4115_1114666.jpg
  • A Turkana woman helps her El Molo husband with the fishing nets while caring for her child.
    RANDY OLSON_MM8259_2327844.JPG
  • Senegalese fishermen haul in nets loaded with fish. With competition intensifying to supply mostly European markets, fishing grounds off West Africa are going the way of Europe’s: toward depletion. These Senegalese, who had hoped to catch desirable export species such as shrimp or sole, will throw away the fish in their nets—wasting valuable protein for Africa.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7393_1055376.JPG
  • The sea captain and workers fish off of the Vetmannaeyjar Islands in Iceland.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7393_1057892.JPG
  • A boy waits inside the cabin while his father and friend fish in the waters off of Prince of Wales Island.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM7258_1075144.jpg
  • A worker catches salmon at a fish camp.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7593_1260947.JPG
  • Grizzlies fish for salmon in one of the best spots where the Ozernaya River flows into Kurilskoe Lake under the backdrop of a volcano.  <br />
<br />
Brown bears are not pack animals and an abundant food supply attracts them to the same place to hunt. The Kurilskoe Preserve is the model for poaching enforcement in all of Kamchatka. It is protected and the last wild place that produces all seven species of salmon.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7593_1260983-16.TIF
  • Brown bears fish for salmon in Kuril Lake. So many salmon—pink, chum, sockeye, coho, chinook, and masu—flood the waters that typically solitary brown bears crowd together
    RANDY OLSON_MM7593_1260983-14.TIF
  • A brown bear's claws hang onto the salmon in Kuril Lake.<br />
<br />
Grizzly bears need to eat about 40 fish a day to put on weight to make it through the winter.<br />
<br />
Brown bears in Kamchatka can be 7 to 9 feet in length and weigh 700-800 pounds. Species: U. arctic Genus:Ursus<br />
<br />
Kamchatka has the highest density of brown bears in the world, with almost 15,000 on the Russian peninsula.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7593_1260983-13.TIF
  • Caviar production area in a fish processing plant.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7593_1260923.JPG
  • Bright orange caviar in production area of a Russian fish processing plant.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7593_1260924.JPG
  • Fish carcasses Vigo, Spain in the largest biomass fish shipping port in the world and is  home to the first fish auction.<br />
<br />
Swordfish and sharks are hauled in by heavy machinery and by hand. Both species are down to 10 percent of their historic numbers. One of the world’s busiest seafood ports, Vigo auctions half a million tons of fish daily. As Europe’s largest fishing nation, Spain’s people consume 80 pounds of seafood per capita, 50 per cent higher than Europe’s average. Lower fish stocks have caused a 20-year decline in Spain’s catch.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7393_1057953.JPG
  • A brown bear swims with his head underwater as he fishes for salmon in Kuril Lake.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7593_1260955.JPG
  • A brown bear photographed underwater while fishing. Bears thrive on salmon but compete with 137 species of fish, birds, and mammals that also depend on salmon as a main staple of their diet. <br />
<br />
Grizzly bears gorge on rich protein of salmon for three months.  Though they munch on greens and berries, salmon are their main protein source and they fatten up before hibernating in the winter. <br />
<br />
Brown bears in Kamchatka can be 7 to 9 feet in length and weigh 700-800 pounds. Species: U. arctic Genus:Ursus<br />
<br />
Kamchatka has the highest density of brown bears in the world, with almost 15,000 on the peninsula.<br />
<br />
To make this photograph, which was selected as one of the best photographs in National Geographic, I had to be approximately six feet away from bears like this one that was charging into the water to try to catch a fish. The water in Duril Lake is murky, so I had to be close and shot this photograph with a 12mm lens.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7593_1248221.TIF
  • Brown bears fish for salmon in one of the best spots where the Ozernaya River flows into Kurilskoe Lake.  An abundant food supply attracts the bears, also known as grizzlies, to the protected watersheds of Kamchatka’s Kurilskoe Lake Preserve, the gem of the Russian preserve system.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7593_1248218.TIF
  • Brown bears fishing for salmon in Kuril Lake. Kurilskoe Lake Preserve is a world heritage site and had serious poaching. But now, two or three wardens are always out on enforcement and they pack out for a month at a time. The official salary for wardens is $200 a month, but the WWF came in and supplemented salaries and bought them the equipment they need to do the job. WWF decided one of the gems of the reserve system that exists in all of Russia should be poaching free - and that also protects the brown bears.
    MM7593_20080812_06379.tif
  • This is a fisherman village right at the edge of the ocean in St. Louis, Senegal.  The authorities have been trying to get rid of this community, but the fishing is the most important aspect of St. Louis and these folks have fought off the government. This time of year they fish at night and are so successful that they have decided amongst themselves to only have half the boats go out each day. The price of fish was incredibly low because there are so many and because these fishermen are so adept at exploiting the resource. Industrialized fishermen pay a license to fish, but then there is no limit for how much they can catch. The artesenal fishermen are not regulated in any way. 600,000 Senegalese participate in the fishing industry. Eighty percent of the fish caught are caught by artesinal fishermen.
    MM7393_20051211_04390.tif
  • Crew members from a family fishing operation land approximately 1,000 Coho salmon in the boat from a purse seine in waters near Craig, Alaska.<br />
Alaska’s fisheries are some of the richest in the world, with fishermen harvesting hundreds of millions of dollars’ worth of salmon, crab, herring, halibut, pollock, and groundfish every year. However, overfishing, exploitation, and poor fisheries management in the ‘40s and ‘50s took a heavy toll on the industry. The state adopted drastic measures that saved the fishing industry from collapse. Tough times again hit the fishermen in the 1970s as the number of boats grew and increasingly efficient gear depleted catch levels to record lows.<br />
Permit systems and reserves helped the commercial industry recover in the late ‘70s—a trend that has continued to the present because of cooperation between scientists and fishermen.<br />
Fishermen and loggers rank in the top two spots for most dangerous jobs. Both are common lines of work for people in the Alaskan outdoors. Since the Bureau of Labor Statistics began tracking fatal occupational injuries in 1980, there were 4,547 fatal work injuries in 2010, and fatality rates of some occupations remain alarmingly high.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM7258_1075033.TIF
  • The commercial Fishing Brigade outside of Sobolevo, Russia, fish the Vorovskaya River, ironically, the same river from which they offload supplies for the pipeline that will eventually destroy their salmon runs.  But at the end of the first big push, their nets are so full of salmon that they can’t immediately load them onto the trucks.  So while fish are in the holding pen, the truck driver has time to play with his dog. <br />
<br />
Commercial fishing is allowed 40 to 60 percent of the fish run every year in Kamchatka.  Poaching can take nearly as much, so on a good year only 20 percent of they fish escape to breed again.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7593_1248222.TIF
  • A boy proudly displays the salmon he caught when the family was fishing near Prince of Wales Island.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM7258_1075143.jpg
  • Artisanal fishermen off the coast of Tanga, Tanzania drop their traps to sell their catch to a Spanish company, “Sea Products.” Sea Products moves octopus, squid, and cuttlefish to Europe, mostly Italy and Greece. Yet, the east coast of Africa can't feed their own countries with fish. <br />
<br />
“If you buy fish in a store, do you know where it comes from?” asks a recent UN report on the alarming 100 percent rise in fishing piracy over the past decade. “It might be stolen from the poor. It could even have cost lives.”
    RANDY OLSON_MM7393_1057950.JPG
  • Crew members refer to this maneuver as the  "fish walk" when they slide across a boat's deck to push pink salmon into the ice storage area. The fishermen were seining in the waters in Southeast Alaska.<br />
Alaska’s fisheries are some of the richest in the world, with fishermen harvesting hundreds of millions of dollars’ worth of salmon, crab, herring, halibut, pollock, and groundfish every year. However, overfishing, exploitation, and poor fisheries management in the ‘40s and ‘50s took a heavy toll on the industry. The state adopted drastic measures that saved the fishing industry from collapse. Tough times again hit the fishermen in the 1970s as the number of boats grew and increasingly efficient gear depleted catch levels to record lows.<br />
<br />
Permit systems and reserves helped the commercial industry recover in the late ‘70s—a trend that has continued to the present because of cooperation between scientists and fishermen.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM7258_1075032.jpg
  • Shrimp fishermen lay their nets in the waters off of Senegal. Women process fish on the shore at Karountine, northwest of Ziguinchor.  A growing number of Africans live on the coast because the ocean is one of the last sources for protein available. <br />
<br />
Authorities have attempted to get rid of this village, but since fishing is the most important aspect of St. Louis, the community has fought off the government to stay here.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7393_1057917.JPG
  • Artisanal fishermen set nets for live reef fish. Pulau is an island nation in the northern Pacific Ocean, located some 700 km east of the Philippines, perched on the Kyushu-Palau Ridge. The westernmost cluster of the Caroline Islands consists of 20 large islands and 566 smaller islands and is one of the world's youngest and least populated nations.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7393_1058029.JPG
  • Fish are laid out to dry in a fisherman’s village right at the edge of the ocean in St. Louis, Senegal.  Atlantic bumpers are a crucial food source in Africa.<br />
<br />
Also known as Atlantic Carangid, Bumper, Goggle-eye, Little Bumper, Pacific Bumper, Plato, Rooter, Spanish Mackerel, Trevally, Yellowtail, Yellowtail Bumper.<br />
<br />
Found singly, over soft bottoms, of the continental shelf, or in schools, near the surface of estuaries and coastal lagoons.<br />
They feed on cephalopods, detritus, small fish, and zooplankton.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7393_1055378-3.JPG
  • A workers hangs onto a rope at a fish plant in Oktyabrsky.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7593_1260926.JPG
  • People ice-fishing on the Ural River in front of the Magnitogorsk Metallurgical Plant.
    GERD LUDWIG_06041_490448.jpg
  • Fish swim around the hanging cages holding reef fish before transport to China and Hong Kong.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7393_1057868.JPG
  • Workers unload and weigh fish on the dock of a cannery. Petersburg port has the largest home-based halibut fleet in Southeast Alaska.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM7258_1075030.TIF
  • Hanging cages hold reef fish before transport to China and Hong Kong. Colorful fish also swim freely around the cages.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7393_1057868-1.JPG
  • Senegalese fishermen returning from setting nets all night.<br />
In Senegal, a new offshore gas terminal, located in the Atlantic Ocean about ten kilometres off Saint-Louis, is beginning to upset fishermen who are lamenting the loss of an area rich in fish. <br />
<br />
A new danger may be looming on the horizon.The launch of gas production is expected to start in 2023. As it draws closer the Secretary-General of the fishing union braces for the worst; meaning the end of any fishing activity in the area.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7393_1057967.JPG
  • Senegalese fishermen returning from setting nets all night in his brightly colored pirogue.<br />
<br />
In Senegal, a new offshore gas terminal, located in the Atlantic Ocean about ten kilometres off Saint-Louis, is beginning to upset fishermen who are lamenting the loss of an area rich in fish. <br />
<br />
A new danger may be looming on the horizon.The launch of gas production is expected to start in 2023. As it draws closer the Secretary-General of the fishing union braces for the worst; meaning the end of any fishing activity in the area.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7393_1057928.JPG
  • A worker at the Kwun Tong Wholesale Fish Market stretches after working long hours unloading a boat in a marina in Hong Kong. According to WWF figures, Hong Kong has the second-highest per-capita seafood consumption in Asia, and is the world’s eighth-largest seafood consumer.<br />
<br />
Damaged by decades of human activity, Hong Kong’s rich marine ecosystem requires concerted conservation effort to recover and flourish.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7393_1057946.JPG
  • Crew members unload a catch of sockeye salmon from the hatch of their fishing boat. Economists estimate the commercial seafood industry contributes $5.8 billion and 78,500 jobs to the Alaskan economy.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM7258_1075052.TIF
  • The last thing many migrating salmon see is this: the claws of a massive paw. Brown bears stun their targets with club-like blows, then gobble up their catch. This underwater shot of a brown bear was made at what is known as a Grizzly in Kurilskoe Lake Preserve, a World Heritage Site. A remote location, one must charter an MI-8 helicopter for a two-hour ride each way, so there aren’t many people to bother these bears. Once they memorize your scent they may come very close, and at times I saw 17 bears in the view shed.<br />
<br />
Brown bears in Kamchatka can be 7 to 9 feet in length and weigh 700-800 pounds. Species: U. arctic Genus:Ursus<br />
<br />
Kamchatka has the highest density of brown bears in the world, with almost 15,000 on the Russian peninsula.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7593_1248227.TIF
  • A proud father photographs his son holding up the salmon he caught on their fishing trip.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM7258_1075145.jpg
  • As part of a pilot program, men test fish for disease at a fish farm.<br />
<br />
The local Hong Kong aquaculture industry is also facing challenges from competition with imported aquatic food products and concern of fish and seafood safety.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7393_1057849.JPG
  • Fish plant worker in a fish processing plant in Oktyabrski, Kamchatka, the town where Soviets built two of the largest fish plants in Russia.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7593_1260953.TIF
  • Fish carcasses dry in the sun on a boat dock.<br />
<br />
Pulau is an island nation in the northern Pacific Ocean, located some 700 km east of the Philippines, perched on the Kyushu-Palau Ridge. The westernmost cluster of the Caroline Islands consists of 20 large islands and 566 smaller islands and is one of the world's youngest and least populated nations.<br />
<br />
Almost 90% of the world’s marine fish stocks are now fully exploited, overexploited or depleted.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7393_1058030.JPG
  • Woman in fish processing plant is:<br />
Nadezhda.
    MM7593_20080806_05057.tif
  • Vigo has the largest biomass fish shipping port in the world. Workers process sharks that are stacked onto pallets after processing. Sharks are down to 10% of historical populations and a large reason for that is an appetite for shark fin soup in China and other parts of Asia.<br />
<br />
Fish is sent all over Spain and abroad to countries like Portugal, Italy, France and other more distant markets including Asia.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7393_1058049-1.JPG
  • Vigo has the largest biomass fish shipping port in the world. Sharks are stacked onto pallets after processing. Sharks are down to 10% of historical populations and a large reason for that is an appetite for shark fin soup in China and other parts of Asia.<br />
<br />
Fish is sent all over Spain and abroad to countries like Portugal, Italy, France and other more distant markets including Asia.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7393_1058049.JPG
  • Vigo has the largest biomass fish shipping port in the world. Swordfish are stacked onto pallets after processing. Fish is sent all over Spain and abroad to countries like Portugal, Italy, France and other more distant markets including Asia.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7393_1057879.JPG
  • Vigo has the largest biomass fish shipping port in the world handling about 675,000 metric tons of fish a year. Lower stocks of commercial species such as Atlantic cod and hake have caused a steady decline over the past five years for Spain’s fleets, which receive the EU’s heaviest subsidies.<br />
<br />
Spaniards consume a hundred pounds (45 kilograms) of seafood a year per person, nearly double the European average and exceeded only by Lithuanians and Portuguese.<br />
<br />
Swordfish are wrapped in plastic on pallets.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7393_1057877.JPG
  • Senegalese fishermen empty their nets of a large haul of fish they caught on their colorful boats.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7393_1057926.JPG
  • David Colson and his crew pull mullet out of their nets onto their airboat at the base of the Suwannee River in the Gulf of Mexico. They shine a light onto the water to attract the fish, then drive in circles dropping their net to trap the confused fish.
    MELISSA FARLOW_05842_470856-3.JPG
  • David Colson and his crew pull mullet out of their nets onto their airboat at the base of the Suwannee River in the Gulf of Mexico.  They shine a light onto the water to attract the fish, then drive in circles dropping their net to trap the confused fish.
    MELISSA FARLOW_05842_470856-2.JPG
  • On a fish factory trawler, a fisherman wields a sharp knife to remove the fin from a shark. Fish are caught and processed onboard while out working for weeks at a time.<br />
<br />
Sharks are down to 10% of historical populations and a large reason for that is an appetite for shark fin soup in China and other parts of Asia.<br />
<br />
Foreign trawlers and an expanding fishmeal industry are increasingly threatening the livelihood of Senegalese fishermen, forcing many to migrate to Europe.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7393_1057909.JPG
  • A  young boy poses beside a pallet of sharks in Vigo which has the largest biomass fish shipping port in the world.<br />
<br />
Sharks are down to 10% of historical populations and a large reason for that is an appetite for shark fin soup in China and other parts of Asia.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7393_1057882-1.JPG
  • Vigo has the largest biomass fish shipping port in the world. Swordfish and tuna are the greatest catches and are in decline from overfishing.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7393_1057882.JPG
  • A customer at Kwun Tong Fish Market passes by large fish in aquarium. According to WWF figures, Hong Kong has the second-highest per-capita seafood consumption in Asia, and is the world’s eighth-largest seafood consumer.<br />
<br />
Damaged by decades of human activity, Hong Kong’s rich marine ecosystem requires concerted conservation effort to recover and flourish.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7393_1057845.JPG
  • David Colson and a crew load up a boat with nets and gear for mullet fish in the Gulf of Mexico. His family and dog watch him head to for the evening where they fish at night.
    MELISSA FARLOW_05842_470856-10.JPG
  • David Colson and his crew pull mullet out of their nets onto their airboat at the base of the Suwannee River in the Gulf of Mexico. They shine a light onto the water to attract the fish, then drive in circles dropping their net to trap the confused fish.
    MELISSA FARLOW_05842_470856.JPG
  • A stringer with a brightly colored fish trails behind a spear fisherman. There is heavy shark activity in this area of Ofu Isalnd, Manu'a Islands, American Samoa, so the smart spear fishermen keep the bleeding fish on a string way away from their bodies.
    NGFishString.tif
  • Vigo has the largest biomass fish shipping port in the world.<br />
A worker carries a shark on a hook through the facility.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7393_1057880.JPG
  • On a fish factory trawler, a fisherman removes the fin from a shark while processing the days catch onboard the boat.<br />
<br />
Sharks are down to 10% of historical populations and a large reason for that is an appetite for shark fin soup in China and other parts of Asia.
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  • A young boy catches a fish on a hook at twilight near the mouth of the Suwannee River and Gulf of Mexico.
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  • El Molo fishermen catch a fish from Lake Turkana.
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  • El Molo fishermen catch a fish from Lake Turkana.
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  • Biologist with spotted Leporinus fish in his hand, the help looks on.
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  • A stringer of brightly colored fish trails behind a spearfisher.
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  • Father and son fish off of Prince of Wales Island.
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  • A fisherman with a fish caught in his net on Lake Turkana.
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  • El Molo fishermen send out their nets in the evening just outside the El Molo village of Komote. El Molo are the people of the lake. Everyone else in this area were pastoralists but with pressure from limited resources many Turkana are moving into this community and taking up fishing. Many El Molo are deformed from drinking lake water. The lake has one inlet and no outlet and gets saturated with minerals and high levels of fluoride. This El Molo village is just outside Loiyangalani.
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  • A family sets up racks to dry salmon and prepares it for smoking at a Native Alaskan Tlingit fish camp at Dog Point near Sitka.
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  • Silhouetted men fish in the Firehole River surrounded by geothermal activity.
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  • Brown bears fishing for salmon in Kuril Lake. Kurilskoe Lake Preserve is a world heritage site and had serious poaching. But now, two or three wardens are always out on enforcement and they pack out for a month at a time. The official salary for wardens is $200 a month, but the WWF came in and supplemented salaries and bought them the equipment they need to do the job. WWF decided one of the gems of the reserve system that exists in all of Russia should be poaching free - and that also protects the brown bears.
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  • Boatloads of Senegalese fishermen return from setting nets all night.The nation’s fleet of small boats, unregulated until recently, hauls in 80 percent of the catch and supplies about 60 percent of the export market. Senegal’s commercial vessels, foreign fleets from Europe and Asia, and pirate fishing boats add to the pressure; the country’s annual harvest declined.
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  • Artisanal fishermen off the coast of Tanga.<br />
The village-based artisanal fisherfolk use traditional technology and small-sized boats. Their knowledge of marine ecology and fishing techniques is based on generations of experience.
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  • Senegalese artisanal fishermen are miles out to sea in the waters off of Dakar in a pirogue or canoe. With a warm upwelling and perfect nutrient conditions, the Senegal coast is the last of the wild west of fisheries. Senegalese look to the ocean for protein where the Mauritanians to the north look to the desert. Senegalese often raid Mauritanian fishing grounds.
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  • A young fisherman casts his line into the Pacific surf on a black sand beach that draws no swimmers because of its undercurrent.  Three generations of this family has been fishing at the Lost Coast every summer for more than 70 years. The remote coastline is named California's King Range National Conservation Area (NCA).
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