Biodiversity and Peak Fish

Biodiversity means different types of organisms living in an ecosystem. Ecosystems include habitats, animals, plants, bacteria, and non-living things like the sun. Climate change affects the biodiversity of ecosystems because it affects the organisms. When the ecosystem is harshly damaged it can sometimes make organisms extinct. It does so by changing the environment, and how the organisms interact together. For example, when the ice melts the Polar bear doesn’t have a habitat. It becomes too hot and the polar bear dies.

Peak fish is the decline of all types of fish. Peak refers to the stage or year when there were the most fish. According to Dave Cohen’s article “Peak Fish and the Biodiversity Crisis” on the Post Carbon Institute’s Energy Bulletin webpage, the fish population was at its peak in the 1980s. This will eventually lead to the extinction of fish. The fish companies, consumers, and recreational fishers aren’t conserving. Conservation means saving. They’re using up all the fish. Fish companies need fish to make money; without fish, they will go out of business. Consumers are eating fish they like it. Recreational fishers catch fish for fun and to save money. Cohen refers to a Yahoo! press report that says “the world faces the nightmare prospect of fishless oceans by 2050” (“Peak Fish and the Biodiversity Crisis”). This prediction means the daily depopulation of fish will lead to fish extinction from human predators. This collapse of biodiversity not only means less fish, but it means the human population could collapse too, since many people eat fish, too. The fish companies will go out of business, and workers will lose their job. Other animals that eat fish will not have fish either. The ecosystem will be destroyed.