Do you know what sprat is? It’s a small, silvery fish, usually no more than 10 centimetres in length. It eats plankton and, in turn, it is eaten by a wide variety of sea life, from cod, to dolphins, whales and seabirds. In the words of Colin Barnes, sprat “fed the whole ocean”.
The fate of the lowly sprat has had a direct impact on Mr Barnes, who has decided to bring an end to the whale-watching tour business he ran for a quarter of a century from Union Hall in West Cork. According to Mr Barnes, zealous overfishing of sprat – to be sold as feed for commercial farming ventures on sea and land – has led to a steep decline in the numbers of other fish, whales, dolphins and seabirds off the south-west coast of Ireland. No sprat means no whales. This week, he told the Irish Times: “It’s an empty, lifeless sea.”
This is not a man who is given to exaggeration or sensationalism. A former fisherman himself, Mr Barnes has traversed the waves off West Cork for over half a century. He is arguably the foremost expert on maritime life in the region and he has been ringing the bell on the issue of overfishing for decades now – here is one of his logs from 2019, for example. Back then, Mr Barnes’ note of caution went thus: “The message is simple, if you want good sustainable fishing to continue, and healthy well-stocked seas, then leave the sprats alone to spawn in peace and maintain their numbers, as was always the case through centuries of Irish fishing history.”
Six years later, the message remains the same: you either prioritise sustainability within the ecosystem or abandon it to the whims of what Colin Barnes calls “a few greedy morons on huge trawlers”. Mr Barnes’ grimly frank assessment of the failing health of the sea around Ireland is something that we should all be concerned about, so contact your political representatives now, email your local TD and kick up a fuss.
For more information on the decline of whales off Ireland’s southwest coast, the Irish Times has published an explainer here.
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