Gökova

This guide to Gökova Bay in Muğla traces how decades of trawling and overfishing emptied the gulf of white grouper and shrimp by 2009, and how marine biologist Zafer Kızılkaya went door to door through fishing villages arguing that the only way back was to catch less. It follows the 2010 closures that shut parts of the bay to all fishing, over the objections of fishermen who had worked these waters their whole lives. Among the rangers who now patrol the no-fishing zones by boat is Ayşenur Ölmez, a lifelong fisher from a village along this same coast.