 | |
| Author | Mark Kurlansky |
|---|---|
| Language | English |
| Genre | History |
| Publisher | Oneworld Publications |
| Pages | 336 |
| ISBN | 9781786078520 |
Salmon: A Fish, the Earth, and the History of a Common Fate is a 2020 non-fiction book, written by Mark Kurlansky and published by Oneworld Publications, about the economic and natural history of salmon. It is a follow-up to Kurlanksky's 1997 book, Cod: A Biography of the Fish That Changed the World. The book is dedicated to Icelandic environmentalist Orri Vigfússon. [1]
Salmon presents the history of salmon, both pertaining to its life cycle and presence in the animal food chain, as well as its impact on humans. [2] The book details how salmon has been used across various countries and cultures, including Japan, Colombia, and Scotland, [3] where it has been fished, and used as food and currency. [4] The book also features various recipes to show how salmon has been historically prepared, and how this has changed over time. [5]
Salmon assesses the environmental damage of industrialisation and overfishing, and notes that they have contributed to a reduced population of salmon. [4] Additionally, the book describes how some solutions to these problems, such as the construction of fish hatcheries, are often counterproductive. [6] In Salmon, Kurlansky argues that the Native American method of fishing with spears and weirs is the only sustainable option of fishing for salmon. [4]
Foreword Reviews called Salmon a "fascinating mosaic of history and science", praising its ability to talk about multiple subjects – "the real beauty of the book is in its subtle transformation of a species often thought of in terms of food into one that needs to be considered with care and even championed. Its historical aspects are not easier to read once these connections are made." [7] Riptidefish called Kurlansky "one of the literary geniuses of our time", and said that Salmon was a "must read for anyone that loves fishing anywhere on the Pacific Coast or beyond for salmon." [8] Similarly, Venturing Angler said that "In Salmon, Kurlansky writes a book that anyone can read because it is a book that everyone ought to read", and praised the book for being easy to understand: "while Kurlansky’s writing leaves no question about his mastery as an academic, he makes the book readable and digestible to all readers". Venturing Angler also noted the book's depth, calling it an "impressively thorough history". [9] Salmon received the 2020 John Avery Award, (part of the Andre Simon Awards), [10] and the silver award for Ecology and Environment by Foreword Reviews. [11]
A kipper is a whole herring, a small, oily fish, that has been split in a butterfly fashion from tail to head along the dorsal ridge, gutted, salted or pickled, and cold-smoked over smouldering wood chips.
Fishing is the activity of trying to catch fish. Fish are often caught as wildlife from the natural environment, but may also be caught from stocked bodies of water such as ponds, canals, park wetlands and reservoirs. Fishing techniques include hand-gathering, spearing, netting, angling, shooting and trapping, as well as more destructive and often illegal techniques such as electrocution, blasting and poisoning.
The term carp is a generic common name for numerous species of freshwater fish from the family Cyprinidae, a very large clade of ray-finned fish mostly native to Eurasia. While carp are prized quarries and are valued as both food and ornamental fish in many parts of the Old World, they are generally considered useless trash fish and invasive pests in many parts of Africa, Australia and most of the United States.
The Eurasian carp or European carp, widely known as the common carp, is a widespread freshwater fish of eutrophic waters in lakes and large rivers in Europe and Asia. The native wild populations are considered vulnerable to extinction by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), but the species has also been domesticated and introduced into environments worldwide, and is often considered a destructive invasive species, being included in the list of the world's 100 worst invasive species. It gives its name to the carp family, Cyprinidae.
Angling is a fishing technique that uses a fish hook attached to a fishing line to tether individual fish in the mouth. The fishing line is usually manipulated via a fishing rod, although rodless techniques such as handlining also exist. Modern angling rods are usually fitted with a fishing reel that functions as a cranking device for storing, retrieving and releasing out the line, although Tenkara fishing and traditional cane pole fishing are two rod-angling methods that do not use any reel. The fish hook itself can be additionally weighted with a denser tackle called a sinker, and is typically dressed with an appetizing bait to attract and entice the fish into swallowing the hook, but sometimes an inedible fake/imitation bait with multiple attached hooks is used instead of a single hook with edible bait. Some type of bite indicator, such as a float, a bell or a quiver tip, is often used to relay underwater status of the hook to the surface and alert the angler of a fish's presence.
Overfishing is the removal of a species of fish from a body of water at a rate greater than that the species can replenish its population naturally, resulting in the species becoming increasingly underpopulated in that area. Overfishing can occur in water bodies of any sizes, such as ponds, wetlands, rivers, lakes or oceans, and can result in resource depletion, reduced biological growth rates and low biomass levels. Sustained overfishing can lead to critical depensation, where the fish population is no longer able to sustain itself. Some forms of overfishing, such as the overfishing of sharks, has led to the upset of entire marine ecosystems. Types of overfishing include: growth overfishing, recruitment overfishing, ecosystem overfishing.
Recreational fishing, also called sport fishing or game fishing, is fishing for leisure, exercise or competition. It can be contrasted with commercial fishing, which is professional fishing for profit; or subsistence fishing, which is fishing for survival and livelihood.
Mark Kurlansky is an American journalist and author who has written a number of books of fiction and nonfiction. His 1997 book, Cod: A Biography of the Fish That Changed the World (1997), was an international bestseller and was translated into more than fifteen languages. His book Nonviolence: Twenty-five Lessons From the History of a Dangerous Idea (2006) was the nonfiction winner of the 2007 Dayton Literary Peace Prize.
The Atlantic salmon is a species of ray-finned fish in the family Salmonidae. It is the third largest of the Salmonidae, behind Siberian taimen and Pacific Chinook salmon, growing up to a meter in length. Atlantic salmon are found in the northern Atlantic Ocean and in rivers that flow into it. Most populations are anadromous, hatching in streams and rivers but moving out to sea as they grow where they mature, after which the adults seasonally move upstream again to spawn.
Stockfish is unsalted fish, especially cod, dried by cold air and wind on wooden racks on the foreshore. The drying of food is the world's oldest known preservation method, and dried fish has a storage life of several years. The method is cheap and effective in suitable climates; the work can be done by the fisherman and family, and the resulting product is easily transported to market.
Game fish, sport fish or quarry refer to popular fish species pursued by recreational fishermen, and can be freshwater or saltwater fish. Game fish can be eaten after being caught, perserved as taxidermy, or released after capture. Some game fish are also targeted commercially, particularly less bony species such as salmon and tuna.
Carl Safina is an American ecologist and author of books and other writings about the human relationship with the natural world. His books include Becoming Wild: How Animal Cultures Raise Families, Create Beauty, and Achieve Peace; Beyond Words: What Animals Think and Feel; Song for the Blue Ocean; Eye of the Albatross; The View From Lazy Point: A Natural Year in an Unnatural World; and others. He is the founding president of the Safina Center, and is inaugural holder of the Carl Safina Endowed Chair for Nature and Humanity at Stony Brook University. Safina hosted the PBS series Saving the Ocean with Carl Safina.
Poke is diced raw fish served either as an appetizer or a main course.
An artificial fly or fly lure is a type of fishing lure, usually used in the sport of fly fishing. In general, artificial flies are an imitation of aquatic insects that are natural food of the target fish species the fly fishers try to catch. Artificial flies are constructed by fly tying, in which furs, feathers, thread or any of very many other materials are tied onto a fish hook.
Rough fish is a term used by some United States state agencies and anglers to describe fish that are less desirable to sport anglers within a defined region. The term usually refers to larger game fish species that are not commonly eaten, are too rare to be commonly encountered, or are not favorably sought by anglers for sporting purposes. Many of these species are actually very important in the commercial fishing industry, where they make up the bulk of commercial food fish catches in inland freshwater bodies.
Orri Vigfússon was an Icelandic entrepreneur and environmentalist. His stated objective was to "restore the abundance of wild salmon that formerly existed on both sides of the North Atlantic".
This general annotated bibliography page provides an overview of notable and not so notable works in the English language regarding the sport of fly fishing, listed by year of first publication. Although not all the listed books are devoted exclusively to fly fishing, all these titles contain significant fly fishing content. The focus of the present page is on classic general texts on fly fishing and its history, together with notable public or university library collections dedicated to fly fishing.
This page is a list of fishing topics.
The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to fishing:
This annotated bibliography is intended to list both notable and not so notable works of English language, non-fiction and fiction related to the sport of fly fishing listed by year published. Although 100% of any book listed is not necessarily devoted to fly fishing, all these titles have significant fly fishing content. Included in this bibliography is a list of fly tying, fly tackle, regional guides, memoirs, stories and fly fishing fiction related literature.
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