We can breed fish by the thousands in farms, yet populations in the wild are dying out. Why can’t we just dump tons of fish fry/larvae into the waters they normally live in, and some will get eaten and some will live, and replenish the populations artificially? Fish aren’t particularly caring parents, so unlike releasing a bunch of lion cubs or something, it will resemble what happens in the environment.
Edit: I’m talking about overfishing specifically here, not climate change or natural diseases or whatever.
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Restocking is a thing we do all the time, but it doesn’t work everywhere on all species.
One reason I haven’t seen mentioned yet is that nature abhors a vacuum, so when a species is over-fished, other fish species move in. If we deplete, then restock, baby fish of a species we want to catch and eat, we are just feeding this new dominant species we don’t want to catch and eat, for free.
Usually better to limit harvest, or shift what we harvest. Restocking can bolster natural production, not replace it.
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