Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- intransitive verb To fish (a body of water) to such a degree as to deplete or exhaust the supply of fish or shellfish.
- intransitive verb To deplete or exhaust (a stock of fish or shellfish) by excessive fishing.
- intransitive verb To overfish a body of water.
- intransitive verb To overfish a stock of fish or shellfish.
from The Century Dictionary.
- To fish too much or to excess; fish so as unduly to diminish the stock or supply of: as, to
over-fish a pond.
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- transitive verb To fish to excess.
- transitive verb To fish so much that the numbers of fish remaining are substantially reduced.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- verb To fish excessively.
- verb To
fish inexcess so as to substantially reduce over several years the supply of one or more species of fish in an area.
Etymologies
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
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Examples
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Huh? Next they state that humans overfish world stocks.
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Given the price of yellow fin tuna it seems eminantly possible to overfish the sea such that fish become rarer (and more expensive driving technolgy to catch every last one) Why should land be any different?
Limits to Growth?, Arnold Kling | EconLog | Library of Economics and Liberty 2009
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If you overfish the lake eventually there will be no fish left.
A big F-ing deal: the distinguishing characteristics of the HCR bill 2010
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I'm sure we would have found a way to overfish the thalattosaur had it survived the volcanic explosions.
Lunch Room Chatter: Crankshaft cuisine, anyone? Tim Carman 2010
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Beggars can't be choosy, however, we overfish too much and everyone wants their fish, soon, there will only be raised fish and that will not cover the demand..
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And on top of that, the quota is there so that they dont overfish and the alaskan king crab becomes extinct, i live in north pole alaska about 10min from fairbanks and ive been to dutch harbor, talked to the factory worker and all that.
Fishing In Alaska 2006
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A feverish push for more industrial deregulation to pollute our air, make our products less safe, overfish our rivers, lakes etc., reduce inspections of imported goods, allowing more restrictions on family medical leave and more.
Bush's final actions Ellen Beth Gill 2008
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We have used our energy to overfish our oceans, over-cut our forests, over-dam our rivers and commit other excesses, as well as filling the atmosphere with carbon gasses at such a high rate for the past 200 years that our climate is changing and compounding our ability to cope with the crisis that we have created.
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Hand, seine and long-line fishing (with 1,500 to 5,000 hooks per line) are used to overfish all commercial species and they cause much destructive by-catch of sharks.
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Humans overfish the seas, overgraze the meadows, overpollute the air, and overdrive the highways.
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