Mackerel made it into the papers this weekend with a two page spread in The Observer and comment from Jay Rayner to the effect that unless we start managing our fishing habits more effectively then all fish will become an expensive luxury available only to a few. His review in the Magazine is of a fish restaurant in London where they manage get away with selling a plate of mackerel for £19.00 In his review he talks about fillets so so there is hope that they are serving more than one fish. Presumably cost is getting them from the sea to the restaurant in the hour or so window you have once they are out of the water before they start to deteriorate.

The main article throws more confusion onto the issue concentrating on the fishing port of Grimsby which is now largely dependant on the Icelandic fishing boats that call there to sell their fish.It is difficult to pick your way through the talk of both sides to get to an answer. There is a suggestion that the downgrading of mackerel is not so much because it is currently in danger but more to try and galvanise both sides into a sensible discussion.

You might also suspect that Iceland has a point. There are a lot of conflicting vested interests on the European side of the argument and it is easy to believe that whatever they come up with will be a fudge. Whilst Iceland is a great deal more dependant on the fish that they catch and may in fact be able to make a good fist of managing their fisheries.

We shall see.

In the meantime I am watching two fat wood pigeons eating the bird seed that has spilled from the feeder that is hooked up to the apple tree. They look good enough to eat and put me in a frame of mind so I am thinking it might be a good idea to have an air rifle to hand in the kitchen.