At 8:47 a.m. on March 12, fish history happened in Port Lincoln,
Australia. A tankful of southern bluefin tuna — regal, predatory
fish prized for their buttery sashimi meat — began to spawn,
and they didn't stop for more than a month. "People said, 'It
can't be done, it can't be done,'" says Hagen Stehr, founder
of Clean Seas, the Australian company that operates the breeding
facility. "Now we've done it." Scientists believe the
breeding population of the highly migratory southern bluefin has
probably plummeted more than 90% since the 1950s. Others have gotten
Pacific bluefin to spawn and grow in ocean cages, but by coaxing
the notoriously fussy southern bluefin to breed in landlocked tanks,
Clean Seas may finally have given the future of bluefin aquaculture
legs. (Or at least a tail.)