Fisheries Services has been designated the North Pacific basking shark as the species of concern. The reason for this is it suffered a dramatic decline in the population despite of the decreasing fishing pressure. To explain, the terminology has been given to the species where there are concerns regarding the population status.
It is not considered to the Endangered Species Act, rather a species of concern due to the reason that it has been over fished and its population has apparently not responded to conservation measures implemented to address fishing pressure. Thus, a public awareness must be given to this. Before putting it to the list of ESA, one must do his or her part in focusing on this little concern.
They are filter feeders and usually exist throughout the world’ oceans from the tropics to the Arctic. They are usually located in temperate coastal waters where currents converge.
There are ways on how to cooperate in the taking care for these creatures. Say for example in U.S., when sharks caught incidentally, they must release immediately back to the ocean. In the state of California, the government bans the retention of basking sharks.

In the food chain or cycle, it is far better strategy for the species to become small and lurking at the bottom than being big, fierce and perched on the top. But when you talk about sharks and anchovies, they would tell you a big different story, according to a new study of fisheries collapses led by Stanford researchers.

The team of the researchers found that populations of small fish such as sardines and anchovies were at least as likely to have collapsed at some point in the last 50 years as stocks of large fish. A major cause of population crashes in all fisheries is overfishing.
In addition to that, small fishes are a vital link in the oceanic food chain and when a species suffers a plunge in population, it hits the mammals, birds and other fish that depend on that species for food. Moreover, small fish live shortly and therefore reproduce and mature faster than large species. As a result, a population drop in a smaller species tends to last about five years, Pinsky said, while larger species need about 15 years to recover.