FishPhone = Phat.

Ever wonder what type of seafood is the safest for your health and the environment? If you’re like me, you usually only remember to ponder this before ordering dinner in a restaurant, or before buying seafood in the supermarket, when the information isn’t readily available.

Enter FishPhone, “the nation’s first sustainable seafood text messaging service,” brought to you by the nonprofit Blue Ocean Institute.

To vet your seafood choice, text 30644 with the message FISH and the name of the fish you’re considering. They send a text back with their assessment of the species health and better alternatives to fish with significant environmental concerns.

Fish are assigned a color from the best option (GREEN) to the worst option (RED) based on environmental concerns (like habitat damage from fishing/farming the species or overfishing) and human health concerns (like high levels of mercury and PCBs).

To try out the service I texted “FISH Red Snapper” that I ordered last time I was in a restaurant, and within 30 seconds got the following unfortunate text back: “Fr: Fish Phone Snapper (RED) significant environmental concerns; fisheries management is poor and populations are declining.” Oops.

Blue Ocean’s Guide to Ocean Friendly Seafood is also available as a website, a webpage for your cell phone or PDA, and for technophobes, as a wallet-sized pamphlet you can print out.

I added FishPhone to my cell phone’s contact list so I won’t make the wrong choice again!