Survey of Oceanography
Homework Set 5
Due 24 March 2004
Late homework will cost 15 points per week or part of a week it is late.
- What is the tragedy of the commons? The term was used by Garrett
Hardin in his now famous article
in Science in 1968. Hardin, Garret. The Tragedy of the Commons. Science,
1968. 162:1243-8. He wrote a follow-up to the article in 1998, Extensions
of "The Tragedy of the Commons." If you are a Texas A&M
University student, and if you have difficulty downloading the paper,
read this
tutorial from the library on accessing journal articles on line.
You will need to go through the Texas A&M University library
site for e-resources, use the scrolling window to pick Words in
Source/Publisher name, click on Search for an E-Journal, do a search
on "Science magazine" in the box. This will bring up a reference
to Science (Washington D.C.). Click on the reference to go to the Science
web site. Browse Archives of Science for Volume 280, then go to Issue
5364 fro 1 may 1998.
- How do his ideas apply to fisheries?
- Based on what you have read in class, where are fish most commonly
found?
- Give another example of a food web. Remember, a food web is not a
food chain.
- Where geographically are phytoplankton most common in the ocean? List
typical types of geographic regions (e.g. open ocean, or shallow coastal
waters, or?).
- Shrimp farming appears to be an ideal way to avoid the problems of
overfishing of wild shrimp.
- But is it all beneficial?
- What are the environmental disadvantages of shrimp farming?
- Please cite evidence for your conclusions.
- What is Texas government doing to reduce overfishing of shrimp and
environmental problems of shrimping?
A really good overview is given in the Texas Parks and Wildlife Texas Shrimp Industry Report of Sept 2002, but this is a large file (5.9 Mb). Otherwise start at Texas Parks and Wildlife Coastal Fisheries Information. Also see Recommendation for 2004.
Revised on: 5 September, 2004
