this is from david morgan's interview of peter megaw, the geologist behind mag silver. megaw expects to see silver production declining on a quarterly basis due to the closures of base metal mines that produce silver as a byproduct.

Morgan: Based on my analysis right now, since 70 percent of silver’s production is by-product mining, and with the deflationary forces that we’re experiencing, do you think that the overall silver production for 2009 and maybe if it will stretch it, 2010, will be equal to, less than, or greater than what they were in 2008?

Megaw: Much less. Just look at what’s happening with copper. Well over half of by-product silver comes from copper mines and the copper price has gone from $4.00 to a buck and a half a pound. The copper miners are already scaling back their production and we’ll probably be seeing copper mines close. Quite obviously, if that happens, there’s an enormous amount of silver that stops coming to the market on the supply side. Lead and zinc are experiencing the same thing, so a lot of that production is going to go away, too. I don’t know what the lead time is before we start to see that showing up in terms of lots and lots of ounces, but I expect to see it soon and increasingly on a quarterly basis.