Rebuilding Crescent City Harbor

Crescent City is rebuilding its harbor following the devastating 2011 tsunami. RCAC’s short-term $3.7 million gap loan and $8.1 million revolving line of credit keep the project afloat between federal and state disaster funding disbursements.

Repairing the harbor, a major commercial fishing port for both Del Norte County and Northern California, is urgent in a county with 13.5 percent unemployment and a median household income of $20,133. Two hundred jobs depend directly on harbor facilities, and another 100 jobs indirectly. RCAC financing is critical to restoring the local fishing and tourism industries.

—

Produced and Edited by Jeremy Raff
Music by Zacharias Flynn

‘JUMBO’ SQUID APPEARING OFF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA COAST

Fishermen catching Humboldt variety, which can be up to 5 feet long, in large quantities off S.D.

Oceanside — Gary Robbins • U-T

Humboldt squid — feisty, ink-squirting creatures that periodically appear along the Southern California coast — have surged into the waters of San Diego and Orange counties, where sport fishermen are catching them by the hundreds.

Sunday night, the sportfishing boat Electra out of Oceanside Harbor caught more than 200 “jumbo” squid in an hour, leading the captain to return to port early.

“I have enough for a whole year,” said John Plaziak of Carlsbad, one of the fishermen.

Five anglers on the Sea Trek out of Helgren’s Sportfishing in Oceanside pulled in 143 squid Saturday night, and 13 people aboard the Fishermen 3 out of H&M Landing in San Diego snagged 144.

“We saw a few of them last year, but nothing in fishable quantities,” said Rick Marin, who works in the office at H&M. “It has probably been two or three years since we’ve seen a lot of them.”

Greg Obymato, captain of the Sea Trek, said, “We caught the squid off San Onofre. But it looks like there’s squid from the Mexican border to Dana Point. It’s just a matter of getting on them.”

Travis Reese of Carlsbad was on board the Electra in a driving rain Sunday about 7:30 p.m. “They’re a lot harder to pull up than I thought. It’s really tough, but it’s a lot of fun,” he said.

Fishermen use poles and hooks with no bait. And the squid put up a whale of a fight.

The squid — which can grow to about five feet in length — have long been something of a mystery. They appear unexpectedly and leave the same way. Usually, they stay offshore. But sometimes they wash up on local beaches, as they did in July 2009 in La Jolla Shores. Fishermen love going after them because the squid put up quite a fight, and they often squirt ink when they’re pulled aboard.

“The squirting is like having a fire hose trained on you,” Plaziak said.

Fishermen usually catch these cephalopods at night. Jumbo squid are vertical migrators; they generally move up and down in the ocean, and they’re typically at or near the surface when it’s dark.

And, yes, you can eat Humboldt squid.

Full story here

Giant Squid Invade Off Dana Point Coast

DANA POINT, Calif. (KTLA) — Giant squid have been appearing along the Dana Point coastline in recent weeks.

Most of the squid, known as Humboldt squid, weigh between 3 and 5 pounds.

However, local fishermen have been known to catch squid weighing as much as 25-pounds in the past.

The last giant squid run was in Sept. 2011, according to Donna Kalez, general manager of Dana Wharf Sportfishing.

Most of the squid have been found 3 to 4 miles from the harbor and about 2 miles off the beach.
Watch video here

El Niños Are Highly Unpredictable

El Niño events are not as predictable as scientists thought. The frequency and strength of the ocean-warming climate phenomenon

It’s in there. Corals collected on islands in the central Pacific reveal that the strength and frequency of the climate phenomenon commonly known as El Niño is highly unpredictable.
Credit: Gary Meek/Georgia Tech

were more variable during the 20th century than, on average, during the preceding 7000 years, according to new analyses of climate records locked within ancient corals. The finding largely discounts the idea that certain long-term variations in Earth’s orbit strongly influence the climate-maker, scientists say.

“This will be a shock for many paleoclimatologists,” says Axel Timmermann, a climate scientist at the University of Hawaii, Manoa, in Honolulu who wasn’t involved in the new research. “[These findings] are a stark contrast to their ideas.”

El Niños are marked by substantially warmer-than-normal sea-surface temperatures along the equatorial Pacific. These events—along with their alter egos La Niñas, which are defined by cooler-than-average sea-surface temperatures in the same region—steer weather patterns across large swaths of the globe, baking some areas while drowning others. Together, these phenomena are called the El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO). In modern times, El Niños occur once every 2 to 7 years; sometimes they’re strong and long-lasting, and other times they’re brief and mild.

Read the full article here.

Department Name Change Effective January 1, 2013

Media Contact:
Jordan Traverso, DFG Communications, (916) 654-9937

The California Department of Fish and Game (DFG) will become the California Department of Fish and Wildlife (CDFW), effective Jan. 1.

The new name was mandated by AB 2402, which was signed Sept. 25 by Gov. Edmund G. Brown Jr. and is one of numerous provisions passed into law during 2012 that affect the department.

“The name of the department was changed to better reflect our evolving responsibilities,” said Department Director Charlton H. Bonham. “As our role has grown to meet 21st century expectations, we remain committed to our traditional responsibilities and to honoring our deep roots in California’s natural resources legacy.”

Traditionally known as game wardens, the department’s law enforcement staff will now be called wildlife officers.

Californians will notice new Internet (www.wildlife.ca.gov) and email addresses for CDFW employees. The old URL and email addresses will continue to work indefinitely.

Many department materials will continue to bear the old name because AB 2402 reduced the cost associated with the name change by preventing CDFW from undergoing a wholesale turnover of materials, including signs, uniforms and supplies.

The mission of the department continues to be “to manage California’s diverse fish, wildlife, and plant resources, and the habitats upon which they depend, for their ecological values and for their use and enjoyment by the public.”

In furtherance of that mission, the department carries out numerous responsibilities related to the commercial, recreational, educational and scientific use and enjoyment of California’s natural resources.

News from CDFW News