This is a site about, by and for New Jersey's fish and seafood industry. Through it we will try to familiarize you with the commercial fishing industry, provide you with some useful information, introduce you to some other places on the web that we find interesting, and keep you up-to-date on issues that, because you are already here visiting, we assume you are interested in. 

Commercial fishing, one of the oldest and most respected of professions, has provided the cultural cement that has held our coastal communities together for generations. Up and down both coasts the impact that the commercial fishing community has had on forming the character of our port cities is obvious. The Fish Pier in Boston, the Fulton Market in Manhattan, Fishermen's Wharf in San Francisco and similar locations all serve as a center for tourism and commerce for the surrounding communities. But they provide much more than atmosphere, fresh seafood dinners and colorful backgrounds for family snapshots. They provide jobs, they generate income and, most importantly, they serve as tangible reminders of our connection to and dependence on the sea. 

As our society becomes more urban, more technologically oriented, and farther removed from our connections to the land and the sea, we tend to loose sight of the traditional values that have served us so well for generations. Land that was at one time inviolate because it was prime farmland is now at the top of someone's list for development into a subdivision or strip mall. Coastal waters that were once recognized as rich and renewable sources of fresh seafood are now considered the exclusive playgrounds of well-to-do yachtsmen, sports fishermen, scuba divers, eco-tourists and jet ski jockeys. One of our primary goals at this site is to reestablish the connection between the seafood on your plate and the coastal or offshore waters that produced it. 

And finally, with the increasing dependence of the print and broadcast media on so-called "sound bite journalism," with the corresponding reduction of exceedingly complex issues to a gross level of oversimplification, and with the increasing public interest in ocean issues, we would like to provide the visitors to this site with more in-depth information and possibly with alternative interpretations for your considered evaluation. 

About the site....

Like most other web sites, this one is a work in progress. It's been, and will continue to be, put together with a few guiding principles that it might be worthwhile to acquaint you with at the beginning. First, and we hope not too disappointingly, there is a paucity of things that flash, spin, morph, fade, explode or crawl across any of these pages. The Web is full of such displays of programming virtuosity at other sites but in many instances it seems that type of media interferes with rather than reinforces the message. Ditto for sounds, though Billy Joel did a song several years ago that might.... 

We've tried to make getting around in the site as convenient as possible. There is a lot of material here and we will be adding to it regularly. We've provided both a Directory and a Table of Contents for  the entire site and you will always be able to return to either by selecting the appropriate button: 
 

In others we've used images of the "targets" along with their names. Finally, at the top of each directory we've listed the different pages and linked the names to the pages. If we've missed in a spot or two, just use your "back" button with our apologies. 

We're planning on providing links to other interesting or relevant sites on the web. We'll do our best to keep them up-to-date but would appreciate it if you would notify us by email if you come across one that is inoperative or takes you to the wrong place. 

You might notice that none of the lists of recipes, species, gear types, books, etc. are arranged in any discernible order. You might suspect that this was a sign of sloppy and/or non-existent editing on my part. If so, you are only partially right. Having an academic career that slightly predated the computer age, I spent quite a bit of time in the stacks of various university libraries. One of the things I found was that the serendipitous discoveries I made - the book that caught my eye on the shelf below the one I wanted, the card that I happened to notice while going through the card catalogue, the bibliographic entry that led me in another direction - were often more interesting and occasionally more useful than what I was initially looking for. 

Unfortunately, with the electronic indexing and search capabilities available to us today, there are few opportunities for these side excursions. It's edifyingly easy to get exactly what you're looking for, to get precisely where you wanted to be. Through listing subject matter randomly I hope I'm nudging you to broaden your interests, to consider other options. While looking for a scallop recipe, instead of going right to the "S" section, you'll get to see what else is there. Not on the next shelf or the next card, but I hope with the same positive results. (And if this is too cmbersome, you can use the "Find in Page...." command.) 

What you'll find here

The commercial fishing industry is large and complex. It pumps a lot of money into the economy and provides a lot of fish and shellfish to local, regional and foreign markets. It is facing some serious challenges and also offers some unique opportunities. As a reflection of all of this, we've tried at this site to offer a smorgasboard of information on many facets of the industry. If you are a seafood consumer, a member of the seafood industry, a student, or simply one of the growing number of citizens with an interest in our international, national or state policies regarding our inshore, coastal or oceanic waters, there should be something here that you'll find interesting. 

To get you started, the following links will take you to the appropriate sections of our Table of Contents: 
 

A campaign to allow NJ consumers to enjoy striped bass again 
Articles relating to fisheries from the popular press, technical journals, etc. 
Books about or peripherally involved with fishing 
Descriptions of New Jersey's various fisheries 
Periodical Fishing Industry trade publications 
New Jersey's commercial fishing ports 
Descriptions of types of commercial fishing 
Images of fishing boats and other fisheries-related subjects 
Past editions of NJ FishNet, an information sheet on fisheries issues 
People in the New Jersey fishing industry 
Links to other commercial fishing sites on the Web 
Recipes featuring New Jersey seafood 
Pages discussing particular topics relevant to fisheries 
Sites where you can get more fisheries information 
Various organizations and agencies involved in fisheries management 
A section on a Pew/SeaWeb engineered consumer boycott of swordfish
A section on trawling/dredging effects
Home page of the Garden State Seafood Association

We'll do it in a box like this: 
 

If anything here is of use to you....

Cut it, clip it, use it - as long as it's for non-commecial purposes. That's what it's here for. Please give proper credit to the author/creator and if it doesn't originate here, please check with the appropriate person before redistributing. 

Thank you very much for visiting. If you are interested in the information here, check back every once in a while. The site is still growing and, even when we've added everything that we think belongs here, we're planning weekly updates. 

Nils E. Stolpe 

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