Mackerel

Mackerel is a common name applied to a number of different species of pelagic fish, mostly from the family Scombridae, found in both temperate and tropical seas, typically in the open ocean but sometimes along the coast, with deeply forked tails and vertical tiger like stripes on their backs that have an iridescent green blue quality. Many species are restricted to particular ranges and live in separate populations or fish stocks by geography; some stocks migrate in large schools along the coast to shallow spawning grounds and back to feeding grounds, later moving offshore into deeper water for a relatively inactive winter, while other stocks migrate across whole oceans. Smaller mackerel are forage fish for larger predators, including bigger mackerel and Atlantic cod, and flocks of seabirds, whales, dolphins, sharks and schools of larger fish such as tuna and marlin follow and attack mackerel schools in cooperative ways. Mackerel flesh is high in omega-3 oils and is intensively harvested by humans, with more than 5 million tons landed by commercial fishermen in 2009.