How Sustainable is Antarctic Krill as a Raw Ingredient?
- Thread starter RD.
- Start date
Hello; I generally understand the logic i personally use when making decisions about interacting with the world & people. Much rarer for me to understand the logic of folks whose views are increasingly different. I imagine there are folks/groups who see my keeping fish in a tiny glass box as being cruel and figured they looked at the captive Orcas the same way.
A story. I was a middle teen at the time. A logger I knew brought two hawk chicks to me. He found them after a tree was felled. Guess he thought I might be able to help them. The chicks were maybe a few weeks from 1st flight. I put them in an empty rabbit cage with some water and hurried to the local library to read up on their care. Main thing was to keep them fed.
My paternal grandmother lived on the same property as my family. One day when I was gone to school, she opened the door and let them out. I was upset. She told me a wild animal ought not be in a cage. They were weeks away from flight so likely became a meal for something. I do not get the logic of my grandma nor the releasing of the orcas entirely. Is it better dead than in a cage?
This is getting pretty far afield from the original topic of krill, but...there is a species of African antelope, the Scimitar-horned Oryx, which was functionally extinct in its native wild range, having been slaughtered in the wild during one of the interminable wars plaguing the African continent. The Oryx had been brought to Texas many years ago and released to live a semi-wild existence on huge "hunting" ranches. People pay big bucks to go down there and shoot these and other exotic critters; not my cup of tea nor that of most hunters, but there ya go.
Ingrid Newkirk, the insane commander of the PETA army of idiots, targeted this practice to add to her bag of whines. She lobbied for the status of the Oryx to be changed in such a way as to make shooting them illegal, which meant that most of the ranchers who owned them in Texas were forced to slaughter them rather than to continue an expensive program of maintaining their semi-feral existence. Sadly for the Oryx...they're delicious. Killing them and selling the meat was the only way to partially offset the huge financial losses the ranchers would suffer, so that's the route most chose in the face of the impending new legislation; these were businessmen, rather than not-for-profit attention-seeking hucksters.
The wild populations in Africa were being brought back from "extinct in the wild" status by re-introductions that originated from the large and thriving Texas populations. When this was pointed out as a benefit of "canned" hunting, Newkirk made it clear that she vastly preferred letting the species go extinct, rather than allowing it to be used for hunting.
So if we follow Newkirk's famous dogma that "a rat is a pig is a dog is a boy"...it's obvious that PETA is more interested in insuring its own continued existence, rather than that of the animals it claims to revere.
How about the MSC, the ASOC, the WWF-UK, the CCAMLR and all those other NGO's? (I had to look that last one up, since it wasn't explained in the article linked by
RD.
Apparently, NGO is a Non Government Organization...an acronym made up to help describe all the other acronyms that clutter up discussions like this one.) They claim to be non-profit...they claim to be helping to save the world...they claim a lot of things. Should we believe all of them? Any of them?
They are analogous to the old woman in the incident descibed by S skjl47 above. Are they releasing the young hawks because of some deep moral conviction that it's the "right thing to do"? Or is taking care of the birds just too much bother, which will interfere with the much more important business of being an old woman?
Ingrid Newkirk, the insane commander of the PETA army of idiots, targeted this practice to add to her bag of whines. She lobbied for the status of the Oryx to be changed in such a way as to make shooting them illegal, which meant that most of the ranchers who owned them in Texas were forced to slaughter them rather than to continue an expensive program of maintaining their semi-feral existence. Sadly for the Oryx...they're delicious. Killing them and selling the meat was the only way to partially offset the huge financial losses the ranchers would suffer, so that's the route most chose in the face of the impending new legislation; these were businessmen, rather than not-for-profit attention-seeking hucksters.
The wild populations in Africa were being brought back from "extinct in the wild" status by re-introductions that originated from the large and thriving Texas populations. When this was pointed out as a benefit of "canned" hunting, Newkirk made it clear that she vastly preferred letting the species go extinct, rather than allowing it to be used for hunting.
So if we follow Newkirk's famous dogma that "a rat is a pig is a dog is a boy"...it's obvious that PETA is more interested in insuring its own continued existence, rather than that of the animals it claims to revere.
How about the MSC, the ASOC, the WWF-UK, the CCAMLR and all those other NGO's? (I had to look that last one up, since it wasn't explained in the article linked by
RD.
Apparently, NGO is a Non Government Organization...an acronym made up to help describe all the other acronyms that clutter up discussions like this one.) They claim to be non-profit...they claim to be helping to save the world...they claim a lot of things. Should we believe all of them? Any of them?They are analogous to the old woman in the incident descibed by S skjl47 above. Are they releasing the young hawks because of some deep moral conviction that it's the "right thing to do"? Or is taking care of the birds just too much bother, which will interfere with the much more important business of being an old woman?
There are numerous pods that are targeting sharks to exclusively eat their liver while leaving the rest uneaten. They attack as a group flipping the shark upside down induces a state called tonic immobility, once immobile they snatch the liver. They are simultaneously terrifying and fascinating having advanced intelligence, strategic thinking, and sophisticated social learning, and this hunting techniques is passed down through generations within certain pods.
The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization monitors over 2,000 fish stocks around the globe. Its 2025 report estimates that 35.5% are fished at unsustainable levels.
So no real surprise to me if Antarctic Krill numbers are also being reduced at greater amounts than what they probably should be.
So no real surprise to me if Antarctic Krill numbers are also being reduced at greater amounts than what they probably should be.
Hello; In the erly 2000's I was driving to Indianapolis IN to see my father. My habit back then was to listen to NPR (national public radio) as I drove the 350 miles. I had already begun to understand the information put out was often flawed but had not quite yet understood such was deliberate. The topic which stuck with me from that day was worldwide fishing was going to collapse within 12 years. Or was it ten years?
Any way the time is well past. The oceans are troubled I do not dispute such. There could be more sensible fishery management which would require all countries to cooperate.
I no longer can give NPR or PBS the benefit of the doubt. The programing is become very biased, including the science. On a different forum site, the discussion got quite deep into the agendas supported. We were not allowed to go that deep on here.
I cannot say what findings from the UN are worth one way or another. I was left with a poor impression with several global originations during the pandemic. Same for NGO's. Too many times, these organizations have proven to have a hidden agenda or few. Often enough simply generating "donations" from folks. Back on this site I seem to recall someone shining light on a popular organization whose advertised goal was to help animals but the bulk of the money going in went to the organization.
Hello; Been thinking about the over harvesting of krill and other fisheries. I think an analogy might be the deforestation of the Amazon which has been going on for decades. I knew a man back in the 70's who was the son of a coal mine owner. He worked heavy equipment and helped make the Trans Amazonian Highway. Over the decades aerial pictures of the area show more and more side branches of that single road. Associated with the side branch roads is deforestation.
Matches a concept I knew of about power and water lines. Say for some reason a community decides to run a line from point A to point B some miles away. What happens over time is a build up between A & B. Shops, gas stations, homes and such. Not saying it is inevitable but have not seen a reversal yet myself.
In either situation there are at least two choices. One is to let things continue to play out to a logical but unpleasant end. Enough over fishing and enough deforestation would appear to end badly for both people and wildlife. The other is to close fishing and logging (I include slash and burn farming in the Amazon).
Pretty sure many will go for the latter unless they are affected.
Whose OX gets gored as the old saying goes is the heart of the matter. Stop either overfishing or deforestation and someone gets hurt. Let me throw in pumping the aquifers dry into the mix. Stop fishing and a food source for people is gone. Stop deforestation and jobs go away. Stop pumping aquifers and grain crops fail.
Sad thing being allowing such things to go on will end in a bad and likely very much worse end for even more folks.
These are not new ideas. Most have been known of for decades. I expected some to have come to a head long ago. My incorrect estimate was a massive collapse around 28 years ago. Anyone who seriously considers these things comes to the conclusion that the damage of stopping such events early will be much less awful than letting them play out to a natural end failure. But so far no one or group with the power to do something is willing to take on the task. i can come up with lots of examples of we know what needs to be done. The homeless living on city streets and turning sidewalks into toilets for one small example.
Matches a concept I knew of about power and water lines. Say for some reason a community decides to run a line from point A to point B some miles away. What happens over time is a build up between A & B. Shops, gas stations, homes and such. Not saying it is inevitable but have not seen a reversal yet myself.
In either situation there are at least two choices. One is to let things continue to play out to a logical but unpleasant end. Enough over fishing and enough deforestation would appear to end badly for both people and wildlife. The other is to close fishing and logging (I include slash and burn farming in the Amazon).
Pretty sure many will go for the latter unless they are affected.
Whose OX gets gored as the old saying goes is the heart of the matter. Stop either overfishing or deforestation and someone gets hurt. Let me throw in pumping the aquifers dry into the mix. Stop fishing and a food source for people is gone. Stop deforestation and jobs go away. Stop pumping aquifers and grain crops fail.
Sad thing being allowing such things to go on will end in a bad and likely very much worse end for even more folks.
These are not new ideas. Most have been known of for decades. I expected some to have come to a head long ago. My incorrect estimate was a massive collapse around 28 years ago. Anyone who seriously considers these things comes to the conclusion that the damage of stopping such events early will be much less awful than letting them play out to a natural end failure. But so far no one or group with the power to do something is willing to take on the task. i can come up with lots of examples of we know what needs to be done. The homeless living on city streets and turning sidewalks into toilets for one small example.
Agreed, one can’t blindly believe all the so called facts and figures from any of these organizations, everyone has an agenda of some sort or another. But at the same time, clearly the world and everything in it is getting depleted faster than it can be replaced. I personally don’t see a happy ending with any of this.
I posted this thread as I’m quite familiar with the companies named in it, and the fact that they supply much of the krill that is used in the aquaculture industry, including many commercial pet food products members here feed to their fish. Just as fish meal costs have risen drastically over the past decade (that old supply and demand thing) I suspect Antarctic krill will also see a significant rise over the next few seasons. The result of that may be some companies using local shrimp meal, a lower cost, less nutrient rich, less desirable, but far less costly, feed ingredient.
I posted this thread as I’m quite familiar with the companies named in it, and the fact that they supply much of the krill that is used in the aquaculture industry, including many commercial pet food products members here feed to their fish. Just as fish meal costs have risen drastically over the past decade (that old supply and demand thing) I suspect Antarctic krill will also see a significant rise over the next few seasons. The result of that may be some companies using local shrimp meal, a lower cost, less nutrient rich, less desirable, but far less costly, feed ingredient.
