US Customs and Border Protection seize endangered fish products worth roughly USD 1 million

U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) officers seized a concealed shipment of totoaba swim bladders weighing a total of 109 pounds at the Nogales trade facility in the U.S. state of Arizona.

According to a release from the CBP, officers at the border crossing seized a total of 91 totoaba swim bladders, with an estimated value of between USD 910,000 and USD 1.36 million (EUR 861,000 and EUR 1.27 million). The seizure is the second of its type at the Area Port of Nogales this year – CBP seized totoaba swim bladders worth an estimated USD 2.7 million (EUR 2.5 million) in June, the second-largest seizure of its type in CBP history.

“This is the second largest seizure of totoaba swim bladders in Arizona this year and is an exceptional example of the job CBP Officers and Agriculture Specialists do to enforce laws regarding all commodities entering the United States,” CBP Tucson Field Office Director of Field Operations Guadalupe Ramirez said. “This seizure also continues to highlight the integral working relationship we have with our US Fish and Wildlife partners, enforcing the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species treaty agreement.”

The totoaba swim bladders, the CBP said in a release, were concealed inside a commercial shipment of frozen fish fillets. Preliminary DNA testing by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service found that the swim bladders belong to Totoaba macdonaldi, a species endemic to the Gulf of California in Mexico. The species has been listed on both the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wilf Fauna and Flora (CITES) and the U.S. Endangered Species Act.

Totoaba has been listed as an endangered species since 1979. The swim bladders of the species resemble the swim bladders of bahaba – or yellow croaker – another engendered species. Both species’ swim bladders fetch high prices on the black market in China, as they are believed to have health benefits when eaten.

CITES briefly sanctioned Mexico earlier this year for its failure to stomp out illegal fishing for totoaba, a practice typically done with gill nets. The fishing for totoaba also impacts the critically endangered vaquita – also endemic to the Gulf of California – which was recently named on an extinction alert by the International Whaling Commission. Vaquita can get tangled in the gillnets used for poaching totoaba and drown.

CITES later lifted the sanctions after Mexico's government created a plan to protect the critically endangered vaquita and the totoaba from illegal fishing. 

Photo courtesy of U.S. Customs and Border Protection