Hold the Anchovies, Please

We eat fish caught daily from the sea.

Their names are familiar and common, 

Haddock, tuna, Pollock and anchovy,

Wahoo, striped bass, wild salmon…

Some names of sea products surprise:

Pork, chicken, turkey and beef!

Farmed salmon, catfish — we emphasize

This meat comes not from sea or reef.

Yet their diet — if true what we read —

Large portion comes from the sea,

In form of small fish used for feed,

Ground up for oil to make puree.

Thirty-seven percent of ocean catch,

By weight, is small schooling fish,

Sardines, anchovies, menhaden in batch,

We net to make for pigs a tasty dish.

It takes three pounds of this mash,

To grow one pound of edible meat,

So process reduces protein stash —

Two thirds of it we simply delete.

Where then is food larger fish need?

Already they’re eight-tenths overdrawn.

Now we compete for their feed,

And rush the day that all are gone.

This is another scary indication

Human propagation’s on the rise — 

With little regard for the implication:

We’re killing our planet! How unwise. 

© 2008 R. Leland Waldrip