{"id":4979,"date":"2008-07-01T14:46:07","date_gmt":"2008-07-01T18:46:07","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/batesviews.net\/?p=4979"},"modified":"2018-06-04T09:31:37","modified_gmt":"2018-06-04T13:31:37","slug":"ecosystem-of-inches","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/2008\/07\/01\/ecosystem-of-inches\/","title":{"rendered":"Ecosystem of inches"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"Every time a putt lips out, or every time a football bangs an upright, you hear the phrase: “It\u2019s a game of inches.” Then there\u2019s commercial fisherman\u00a0Eric Hesse \u201986, the subject of a photo essay<\/a>. He works in an ecosystem of inches.<\/p>\n

Take the new rule, passed in 2007, that lowered by one inch the minimum size of haddock that Hesse can keep. Though the change, from 19 to 18 inches, could put more fish into Hesse\u2019s\u00a0Tenacious<\/em>, he says it reflects old-school thinking.<\/p>\n

“For the past several hundred years, we\u2019ve used the Spanish view that [fisheries] are limitless,” Hesse told me. “It\u2019s only when you begin to believe that the resource is bounded by the ecosystem that you understand\u00a0that withdrawals [of fish], and hence the\u00a0value<\/em>\u00a0of the withdrawals, are also limited.”<\/p>\n

Since smaller haddock bring a lower per-pound price ($1 a pound, compared with $2 for larger haddock), allowing smaller, less-profitable fish to be caught might devalue the fishery\u2019s overall value, says Hesse. It also removes fish from the ocean that have yet to spawn.<\/p>\n

Clearly, for Hesse, fishing is more than “just hours on a boat,” says his wife, Lee Ann Swan Hesse \u201986. “His thrill is in seeing the big picture.”<\/p>\n

That deep\/wide perspective is why we profiled Hesse. It\u2019s why we choose any story topic, whether it\u2019s Hesse fishing Cape Cod or\u00a0economist Margaret Maurer-Fazio<\/a>\u00a0teaching her students to “learn to observe and observe to learn” in China. Like the ocean, the revealing truths of any story are beneath the surface. Hesse, for example, is an officer of the\u00a0Cape Cod Commercial Hook Fisherman\u2019s Association<\/a>, helping to empower fishermen \u2014 a famously independent lot \u2014 to adopt sustainable perspectives and practices.<\/p>\n

A Cape Cod native, Hesse has fished commercially since his student days. A Bates physics major, he later earned a master\u2019s in environmental engineering but chose to return to commercial fishing during the 1990s. His is not an unusual voyage. At a party the other day (Bates relevance: it was hosted by an alum), I asked a marine biologist for his perspective on someone like Hesse. He\u2019s seen it before, the biologist told me: fishermen who bring great experience and intelligence to bear on their work. “They often have a unique understanding of the resource,” he said.<\/p>\n

Photographer Lincoln Benedict \u201909 is a good bellwether of the Bates experience, as he has high regard for Bates people who\u2019ve found ways to pursue lifelong passions. Benedict returned jazzed, though weary, from his overnight journey on Hesse\u2019s\u00a0Tenacious<\/em>\u00a0last November, deeply impressed by the captain\u2019s wide-ranging knowledge and, especially, his zeal. “Eric fishes,” said Benedict, “hell or high water.”<\/p>\n

“I\u2019ve enjoyed my share of cranial pursuits,” Hesse said in his pronounced Massachusetts accent. “But I also like the physical aspects of the job, and it\u2019s great to be outdoors.” He said this as the\u00a0Tenacious\u00a0<\/em>returned to Harwichport and the sun broke from the clouds.<\/p>\n

“And as you can see,” he said, “this is an exceptional day.”<\/p>\n

By H. Jay Burns, Editor<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Every time a putt lips out, or every time a football bangs an upright, you hear the phrase: “It\u2019s a game of inches.” Then there\u2019s commercial fisherman Eric Hesse \u201986, the subject of a photo essay. He works in an ecosystem of inches.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":148,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_hide_ai_chatbot":false,"_ai_chatbot_style":"","associated_faculty":[],"_Page_Specific_Css":"","_bates_restrict_mod":false,"_table_of_contents_display":false,"_table_of_contents_location":"","_table_of_contents_disableSticky":false,"_is_featured":false,"footnotes":"","_bates_seo_meta_description":"","_bates_seo_block_robots":false,"_bates_seo_sharing_image_id":0,"_bates_seo_sharing_image_twitter_id":0,"_bates_seo_share_title":"","_bates_seo_canonical_overwrite":"","_bates_seo_twitter_template":""},"categories":[7,232,14,32],"tags":[664,10856,4027,5214,10764],"class_list":["post-4979","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-alumni","category-environment-sustainability","category-faculty-staff","category-maine-and-new-england","tag-agriculture","tag-bates-magazine","tag-h-lincoln-benedict","tag-lee-ann-swan-hesse","tag-physics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4979","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/148"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4979"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4979\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":62669,"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4979\/revisions\/62669"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4979"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4979"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4979"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}