'Lines on a map' don't do enough to stop damage, report says (Vancouver Sun today)
"Paper parks" are not doing nearly enough to protect the world's coral reefs, says a Canadian-led team fighting to save the endangered ecosystems that once teemed with sea life.
The last paragraph says
"It has been estimated up to 30 % of corals and sea sponges off the BC coast have been destroyed inadvertently by commercial fisherman in the last 50 years, with most of the destruction taking place in the last decade."
In the last 10 years, I guess that was when they allowed the commercial fleet to do bottom dragging to make up for no salmon openings. So after one species gets fished to death DFO lets them target another to make a mess out of. I noticed a severe decline in bottom fish over the same period. I know some of the people who took the opportunity to devastate the bottom with there unholy approach and they said "#@%& *!!" It's sport fishers doing that. I guess the sport fishers are damaging the sponges and corals as well. Ban bottom dragging trawling it's clearly not worth the money commercially, make more on sport fishing licenses.