What's in a name?   

 

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who would have believed ?clear.gif (35 bytes)
why do names matter?
   
photo by Rudie Kuiter
Rexea solandri
gemfish
 
The gemfish fishery in New South Wales was strongly marketed in the early 1980's. The fishery was managed on the basis that fish being taken were from a single population distributed around the southern half of Australia. Large numbers of gemfish were caught and the fishery collapsed in the early 1990's. Subsequent research revealed that two species were involved, not one. The southeast Australian fishery targeted a species confined to that area. The population was only a fraction of the size that fishery managers had thought.