Feds vote to close sardine fishery for third consecutive year.

After the historic collapse of the Pacific sardine in the 1940s, one might assume that humans would have learned their lesson. But history has a way of repeating itself.

Despite the sardine fishery being closed off the U.S. West Coast for the past two years, populations of the iconic small fish have yet to recover. 

As a result, the Pacific Fishery Management Council voted unanimously this morning to keep the sardine fishery closed for at least another year, until the end of June 2018. 

Scientists from the marine conservation nonprofit Oceana attribute the low numbers to overfishing sardines in recent years as their population dipped naturally due to weather cycles. 

Geoff Shester, Oceana's California Campaign Director, says, "It could be a sustained collapse.

"There is very clear evidence there was overfishing as the stock was plummeting," Shester adds. 

Pacific sardines are typically targeted by fishermen from the U.S., Canada and Mexico, but there is no collective agreement among the three countries about how the sardine fishery should be managed. 

Presently, there are an estimated 86,000 metric tons of sardines off the West Coast, an extremely low number by historical standards, and one that has more or less plateaued in recent years. 

"I won’t be surprised to see the stocks remain low for at least a decade," Shester says. "Scientific studies show that when there's a collapse, recovery takes a lot longer."