DAVID CONOVER from Stony Brook University, New York, claims that fishing only for large fish and rejecting the small fry creates a selection pressure which forces down the size of individual fish (Â鶹´«Ã½, 13 July, p 21). If trawlers took some of the smaller ones, the biomass of the fish population would actually go up, rather than down, he says. For some time European policy has been to throw the smaller fish back, so if Conover says is right, fish populations must be severely depleted.
I raised this suggestion with fisheries minister Elliot Morley. His response was rather…
