Why do anglers prize bass but shun gar? Scientists say we need a paradigm shift to help ecosystems, save species

Study co-author Solomon David of Nicholls State University in Louisiana holds a bowfin, a bony fish related to gars.

Avid bass fisher Eric Matechak writes that he loves bass fishing
because the species is challenging prey. Bowfin are fighters too.

An article recently published in Fisheries magazine, a peer-reviewed journal for fisheries scientists and managers, argues that certain types of fish, such as bass and salmon, are preferred to "rough" or "trash" fish because "European and white males have overwhelmingly dominated fisheries science and management in the USA."

From the nation's early days, such officials tended to place lower value on fish commonly eaten by indigenous tribes, immigrants, and people of color, Lela Nargi reports for The Counter. And while attitudes and regulations about fish species have "shifted substantially" over the past century, policies for many rough fish species haven't.

Anglers and consumers should look at rough fish differently, the study says, because such fish are critical to ecosystems and are vulnerable to overfishing and decline when fishing policies don't set bag limits. One study contributor, Matthew Miller, director of science communications for The Nature Conservancy:, told Nargi: ""All fish have value."

Nargi notes that half of the world's fish species "Live in freshwater, which accounts for a mere 1 percent of the surface water on our planet. Many of those species are in decline. In places like California, which has a variety of endemic fish that only occur in that state, '83 percent are in some form of decline,' said the study’s lead author, Andrew Rypel, a professor in the Department of Wildlife, Fish & Conservation Biology at the University of California, Davis."