Huettmann, Falk

English

The Canadian Field-Naturalist (E-Journal)

peace. Instead, he recounts the passions that formedthe movement and kept it motivated, and the innerconflicts that forced its evolution. The history certainly has its shortcomings. A tire-some Lord of the Rings analogy runs throughout the574 pages of text, and the foreshadowing of futureGreenpeace trouble is almost constant. Most distract-ing is Weyler’s tendency to tediously set a scene, detail-ing the room, the lighting, and even the contents ofpaintings hanging on the walls. But his goal is as muchto convey the emotion as the historical record of thesefirst nine years, and the details help to transport thereader to the time and place remembered. (Weyler’selaborate scene-setting becomes slightly more under-standable once we learn that he is the group photog-rapher.)Ultimately, Weyler’s passion and enthusiasm for theideals of the Greenpeace movement are shared withthe reader in a style that is politically, scientificallyand historically informed, making his book the per-fect starting point for anyone who is looking foreither a history of Greenpeace, or the inspiration tobecome politically and environmentally active. Thishistory, I think, will make Greenpeace’rs proud, as itfunctions as a mindbomb: reading about Greenpeace’scommitments, their successes and failures, awakensan awareness of the potentials of eco-activism withineach reader. You can put the book down, but youcan’t stop thinking about it…ERICA KELLYUniversity of Western Ontario, London, Ontairo N6A 5B7Canada2005 BOOK REVIEWS 313The Last Great Sea: A Voyage Through the Human and Natural History of the North PacificOceanBy T. Glavin. 2000. David Suzuki Foundation and GreystoneBooks Douglas & McIntyre Publishing Group, Vancouver/Toronto, Canada. 244 pages, $34.95 hardcover.This book belongs in every conservationist’s book-shelf, to say the least. As D. Suzuki describes very con-vincingly in the foreword, the environment of today’sNorth Pacific is characterized by its loss of (fish) speciesand its wipe-out of protein assemblages. The collapseof Sockeye Salmon is only one of many sad examples,many more exist: Steller’s Sea Cow, Spectacled Cor-morant, Dwason’s Caribou (Queen Charlotte Islands),and even plant species like Tobacco (Queen CharlotteIslands). Other species like Walruses, Sea Otters andFur Seals barely survived until now.The first chapter starts slow but allows a very solidoverview about historical and archaeological facts.Already after Chapter 2, nobody can deny anymorethe environmental disaster and mis-management ofthe North Pacific and coastal British Columbia. Nev-ertheless, the author convinces the reader that theNorth Pacific still is THE largest fish producer in theworld. “As in aboriginal fisheries, mythology playeda part in industrial fisheries management, especiallythe myth of a superabundant ocean and the all-pow-erful capability of science and technology to fix themesses made by hydroelectric dams, lousy forestrypractices and overfishing”. The governmentally encour-aged Merganser Control and Bear Shooting Programsdesigned for the sake of Salmon Protection prove thiscitation very well. Galvin strongly eliminates all illu-sions on how to heal the problem of overfishing. Forinstance, he shows that S. Livingstone’s widely fol-lowed idea of Fish Hatcheries does not produce moresalmon, but instead takes away funds and harms nat-ural salmon stocks since they simply replace the lastremaining and struggling stocks with poorly adjustednew ones. Strong also are Gavin’s arguments againstSalmon Farming; e.g., it contributes to the closure ofmarine fisheries for wild salmon, and it requires 3 kgof fish to produce 1 kg of salmon.Fisheries and the ecology of all major North Pacificfish species get well-covered in this book. Since theabundance of salmon shaped western North America,this topic receives major attention in the text. AllPacific salmon species are discussed: Chum, Sockeye,Pink, Coho, Steelhead, Masu and Amago. Of majorinterest is in this regard the scientific discussion aroundthe taxonomy of salmon; e.g., Steelhead (classified until1980s as Trout). The author brilliantly points out theimplications of the religious-based and somewhatoutdated taxonomical system by Carl von Linné, andhow this affects the species management by nationalgovernments (provincial and federal) on an interna-tional level even (Canada vs. USA). The backwardness and failure of fishery laws areshown by outlining that the first salmon-fishing regu-lations for the Fraser River was a simple word-for-wordreplication of fishing regulations on English Rivers.At that time, Canada’s external affairs jurisdiction wasstill controlled by the British, which affects the Cana-da-U.S. salmon treaty concluded 1930s and renewedin 1985. In addition, Galvin shows that Canadian andU.S. fishery scientists significantly differed in theirstock assessment results for the same species in thesame waters even; consequently, so did the manage-ment and political agendas. This is the classical pic-ture of “mixed-stock” fisheries, which also threatenssmall salmon runs.The author reports the incidental death of 50 000marine mammals and 500 000 seabirds due to driftnetfishery activities in the North Pacific; marine (plastic)pollution comes with it. Despite the well shown fail-ure of a European and Western approach dealing withthe North Pacific fisheries, domestic Japanese andNative fisheries seemed to work well and be sustain-able. Galvin shows the magnitude of “pre-contact” fish-ery for salmon by natives, which was even compara-ble with levels of commercial fisheries from this cen-tury. Some readers might find that the book slightlyfollows stereotypical views of the noble native. A very strong point in this book is how the NorthPacific and its fauna is linked with the “hinterland”:Old-growth rainforest, landscape and Bald Eagles.This needs to be considered in the light that residentKiller Whales in British Columbia are among the mostcontaminated cetaceans of the world.A very complete picture of the North Pacific is por-trayed by fully considering the Russian influence andhistory. The book outlines well that Russian settlersdid much better than the western type of colonization(a point that might be put in doubt for the KodiakIslands at least). The Russian-American Company wasmuch more relevant in the history of North Pacificsettlements and explorations than the Hudson BayCompany (HBC). But nevertheless, as with the HBC,the Russian quest for the North Pacific had the samemotivation: central European pelt resources were al-ready overhunted!Regarding the marine ecology of the North Pacific,the importance of the Aleutian low, Pacific currents,and El Nin~o are fully described. This ecosystem isdriven by “regime changes”, which calls for a dynam-ic management. The author outlines this very well bypresenting the ground-breaking work from RussianScientist T. Baranov, but also from Bill Ricker “Rick-er curve” and others at the Pacific Biological Station,e.g., G. McFarlane and D. Beamish. A quote from thebook says it all: Understanding catch statistics is like“reading a single faded and crumbling onionskin pagefrom an early draft of Wagner’s Tannhaeuser, in a dimlylit room”. Another quote of the book and taken fromthe U.N. Code of Conduct for Responsible Fisheriesstates, in part, that “the absence of adequate scientificinformation should not be used as a reason for post-poning or failing to take conservation and manage-ment measures”. Well said.Galvin makes a strong case that ethnocentric ap-proaches for understanding and managing the NorthPacific have failed, e.g. the Chinese might have beenin North America much earlier than the Europeans.The book elaborates on the major question “who camefirst” since it had such a major economical and politicalimplication for European powers. A major conclusionfrom this book is that there never was such a thing likean Old World (Eurasian) and New World (Americas). The chapters on anthropology and human historyof the North Pacific and how the Russians, Asians andNatives settled and explored the North Pacific are onthe same level than high-caliber books as Guns, Germsand Steel by J. Diamond. Just to name some high-lights, Glavin mentions how natives grew Arrowheadand potatoes, he cites the work of the Russian Anthro-pologist S. Fedorova, and he documents that Hawai-ians, Japanese, Chinese and Russians presented a majorgroup of settlers. In addition, the book reports a lot ofBritish Columbian and Vancouver history and putsCanada in the context of the overall Pacific.Despite the fact that whaling, sealing and eatingdolphins is as old as the human history of the NorthPacific, whale watching (starting as early as 1907) hasalready produced more profit than commercial whal-ing ever did for western North America. Greenpeacestarted in Vancouver, it “was born in the blood ofwhales”. Nevertheless, the author shows that alreadyin the 19th century the pelagic seal hunt provoked thefirst great international controversy about the over-harvesting of the world’s marine mammals. It resultedin the international milestone contract (“fur seal treaty”)of 1911 between Russia, Japan, Canada and USA.Topics mentioned in the seven chapters of this bookare so manifold and detailed that only some can bementioned in this review: Bute Wax, Russian scientistK. V. Belkemishev, occurrence of pilchards in BritishColumbia, oolichan grease, geoduck, Pollock fisheries,Korean squid fisheries, canneries, Earth Rotational Vel-ocity Index, J. Cook, G. Vancouver, V. Bering and J. J.Walbaum. Although the author emphasizes the prob-lems with old-fashioned type of science for the NorthPacific, the book is actually based on scientific publica-tions. The index and the annotated scientific referenceswill be highly appreciated by the scholar. This text book(no pictures but five maps) has no shortcomings.FALK HUETTMANNBiology and Wildlife Department, University of Alaska, Fair-banks, Alaska 99775-7000 USA314 THE CANADIAN FIELD-NATURALIST Vol. 119Quantitative Conservation Biology: Theory and Practice of Population Viability AnalysisMorris, W. F., and D. F. Doak. 2002. Sinauer Associates Inc.,Sunderland Massachusetts USA. ISBN 0-87893-546-0paperback (41.95 US$)This is a great book, which should affect how weresearch and manage wildlife and its controlling fac-tors. The topic of a Population Viability Analysis(PVA) is not really new, but there are only few booksthat describe the topic well for the general public andmanagers. “PVA is the use of quantitative methods topredict the likely future status of a population or col-lection of populations of conservation concern”.“The promise that PVA holds as a tool for guidingconservation decision-making has been recognized bygovernmental science advisory boards, by professionalorganizations such as the Ecological Society of Amer-ica and by nongovernmental conservation organiza-tions such as The Nature Conservancy.” This statementalso holds for the Habitat Conservation Plans and forthe Recovery Plans of the U.S. Endangered SpeciesAct. However, “Instead of seeing PVA as a valuabletool to aid their decision making, most field-orientedconservation biologists retain the misinterpretation

"The Last Great Sea: A Voyage Through the Human and Natural History of the North Pacific Ocean" by T. Glavin [book review]

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"The Last Great Sea: A Voyage Through the Human and Natural History of the North Pacific Ocean" by T. Glavin [book review]

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