Advanced technology provides insight into marine habitats

The pattern of boom and bust in major commercial fisheries has occurred many times around the world, and always with major economic consequences. A classic example is the sardine fishery in Monterey Bay. At the sardine fishery apex in the 1930s and 1940s, more than 100 vessels harvested 700,000 tons of sardines and sold them to 19 canneries and 20 reduction plants — the largest assemblage of seafood processors in the Western Hemisphere. By 1952 the sardine population had plummeted, the fishery had collapsed and most of the canneries had closed.