Fishing for a Solution · Episode 7 of 12 · 18 min
The Bering Sea Food Web
Pollock sit at the hinge of one of the most productive ecosystems on Earth, eating plankton and eaten by sea lions, fur seals, seabirds and other pollock. Whether young fish survive depends less on any boat than on sea ice, the cold pool and the plankton. The episode follows the Steller sea lion collapse that put the fleet in court in 2000, the Pribilof fur seals, starving seabirds, and the two-million-ton ceiling.
Who's who
- James Ianelli+1 more episodeNOAA lead author of the eastern Bering Sea pollock assessment
- Elizabeth SiddonNOAA scientist who edits the Ecosystem Status Report
- Lisa EisnerNOAA oceanographer who led the study of pollock moving north
- Thomas ZillySeattle federal judge who halted trawling in sea lion habitat in 2000
- Alan SpringerCo-author of the killer whale hypothesis for the sea lion collapse
- Megan WilliamsOcean Conservancy scientist who warned of data gaps in 2025
- John Wayne MelovidovPresident of the St. Paul Island tribal council
Where it happens
- Eastern Bering Sea shelfCold pool organizes where fish and predators live
- Pribilof Islands, AlaskaBreeding grounds for about half the world's northern fur seals
- St. Paul Island, AlaskaStarving seabirds washed up there from 2016
- Prince William Sound, AlaskaEastern edge of the western Steller sea lion range
Timeline
- May 1982Council adopts a range for all Bering Sea groundfish
- 1997Western Steller sea lions reclassified as endangered
- July 20, 2000Judge Zilly halts groundfish trawling in sea lion critical habitat
- October 2016Starving seabirds begin washing up on St. Paul Island
- 2022Pollock spawning stock reaches about 92 percent of its estimated peak
- March 10, 2026Groundfish limits published, summing to two million metric tons
Still debated
Why Steller sea lion numbers fell is still debated, with the killer whale hypothesis unsettled, and no single cause is named for the fur seal drop. How adult pollock catch changes young survival is not settled, and the two-million-ton ceiling is fixed in law from catches in a colder sea.