Real Deep Sea Fishing

In an amazing story from earlier in the week, an Indonesian fisherman caught a coelacanth, which is a rare fish that has survived from the time of the dinosaurs. They were known only through fossil records until 1938 when one was caught off the coast of Madagascar. Since they live in deep water, they do not live long near the surface so they are rarely seen although the number of sightings since 1938 was significantly more than the previous 65 million years.

Now this find has prompted my interest in what does a coelacanth taste like? I know that there are wild game dinners where they serve exotic meats but what would a coelacanth steak cost per pound? What wine would you serve with coelacanth? Would it make great sushi? I can see the Japanese fishing fleet setting sail for the Indian Ocean in search of the great coelacanth fishing grounds. We can slow down on our shark fin harvesting and concentrate on the truly rare and exotic species.

Another sea life articles recently trumpeted that a large find of previously unknown marine creatures were discovered in the waters around Antarctica. This seems to run counter to every article I read about man’s unbridled destruction of the planet. We have a fish that has survived phenomenal Earthly disasters that included bouts of global cooling during the ice ages and global warming caused by the reversal of ice ages. If a fish can survive such dramatic climate changes over a 65 million year period, how do we keep getting headlines like European mammals face extinction or climate change may imperil plants. The love of doom and gloom is a bad place to spend your life.

Icool

Cobb