The Santa Monica Bay is waking up after a very slow summer surface bite.

The Santa Monica Bay is waking up after a very slow summer surface bite.

There has been a conspicuous lack of bass and barracuda leaving most anglers with rockfish as the only viable option. That may all be changing.

Copious amounts of market squid have taken up residence off Hermosa Beach and, as we all learned in our high school biology class, the big ones do come out to eat the little ones.

Halibut, white seabass and some fat sand and calico bass are starting to bite, as well as a few yellowtail. Squid is an essential part of the food chain and acts as a magnet to a variety of gamefish.

Gary La Croix from the sportfishing vessel Highliner, out of Redondo Sportfishing, has had several days of good white seabass fishing this week. “This bite is really turning around,” said La Croix. It’s looking better and better all the time.”

Good Captains like La Croix use a variety of tools and sources to find fish. Sonar, sea surface temperature gages, radar and radios are just a fraction of what good skippers use to locate their prey. But who would have ever thought that you could add paddle boarders to that list.

Read the full article here.

Monterey Bay trawling deal hailed as a breakthrough: Fishermen, environmentalists long at odds

A “lava-in-water” effort to redefine trawling boundaries off the Central Coast may prove a turning point in the long-simmering relationship among commercial fishermen, environmentalists and the Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary.

The groups spent nearly a year negotiating a proposal that identifies areas the Pacific Fisheries Management Council should reopen and close to bottom fishing in the sanctuary. It was a task, participants said, that took its toll and tested the mettle of individual patience.

“There were times in it where everybody was pretty much fed up and ready to walk away, especially when the environmental groups got involved,” said Monterey fisherman Giuseppe Pennisi II.

“This was like mixing lava with water,” he said. “We had stuff boiling everywhere. We had to stop meetings and everybody go out and cool off.”

In the end, they came up with the hallmark of a good compromise: nobody got everything he wanted.

Sanctuary Superintendent Paul Michel described the outcome as a “precedent-setting, historic accomplishment.”

The “Essential Fish Habitat” boundaries were last set in 2006. Research since then identified new areas of coral and sponge that needed critical protection, said Michel.

At the same time, fishermen were unhappy with the hop-scotch effect of the boundaries. They were spending less time fishing than they were picking up and putting back nets to avoid protected areas.

“We just wanted to get some of our traditional places back that were just sand and mud,” said Pennisi. “Oceana just wanted real estate. They got back a lot more than what they gave up.”

Still, the third-generation fisherman credited the sanctuary’s Karen Grimmer, Monterey Harbormaster Steve Scheiblauer and Huff McGonigal of the Environmental Defense Fund for guiding the combatants to a “common goal” — more fish.

The proposal was submitted to the fisheries council July 31. That agency will submit its recommendation to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration for final approval, a process that could take two years.

Geoff Shester of Oceana said the process was so encouraging that his group, historically at odds with fishermen, is hoping to reach a future consensus that would open trawling to prized parts of Monterey Bay, which sits in state waters, in exchange for additional closures in federal waters.

Read the full article here.

California Wetfish Producers Association

California’s fishing industry was built largely on ‘wetfish’, so called because historically these fish were canned ‘wet from the sea’, with minimal preprocessing. Sardines, mackerel, anchovy and market squid (now called coastal pelagic species) have contributed the lion’s share of California’s commercial seafood harvest since the turn of the 20th century.

The enterprise of immigrant fishermen founded California’s wetfish industry, building up the ports of Monterey and San Pedro, San Diego and San Francisco. Today’s wetfish industry is a traditional industry with a contemporary outlook: streamlined and efficient, but still peopled by fourth and fifth-generation fishing families. Today the sons and daughters continue the enterprise begun by their fathers and grandfathers 100 years ago.

Transformed from its storied beginning, California’s wetfish industry remains an essential part of the state’s fishing culture, as well as a key contributor to our fishing economy, producing more than 80 percent of the volume and 40 percent of dockside value of all commercial fishery landings statewide.

Coastal pelagic species are also among the Golden State’s most important seafood exports. In a state that imports more than 86 percent of its seafood, the wetfish complex contributes close to 80 percent of all seafood exports, helping to offset the seafood trade imbalance.

This industry has invested in cooperative research since the beginning of the California Cooperative Fishery Investigations (CalCOFI) in the 1940s, when wetfish fishermen assessed their harvest to help fund the research partnership developed among the California Department of Fish and Game, Scripps Institution of Oceanography and the Southwest Fisheries Science Center (SWFSC).

Wetfish industry leadership established the nonprofit California Wetfish Producers Association (CWPA) in 2004, including fishermen and processors who produce most of the harvest statewide. CWPA’s mission promotes education, communication, and cooperative research to ensure sustainable fisheries.

Today CWPA’s research program continues the CalCOFI tradition, collaborating with the California Department of Fish and Wildlife and Southwest Fishery Science Center to expand knowledge of coastal pelagic species.

Read the full story here.

California’s squid industry is booming

For years, the squid business in Morro Bay has been light weight, but this year, it’s heavy. Tons and tons of Market Squid are brought into the harbor every morning.

The abundance is because it’s spawning season. At this time of the year, Market Squid travel in massive schools to spawn and die.

The squid industry was volatile for a few years because the state did not want them to be over-fished, so regulations were put in place. Today, there is a limit on how many one boat can catch, and under new regulations, they cannot be fished on the weekends.

“This boat went out last night. They can get 40 tons in a couple hours,” said Giovanni DeGarimore.

The Ocean Angel threw nets just off the coast from Pismo Beach.

“They use these big nets. So they circle it and then they close it up at the bottom and scoop it all up,” he explained.

Once they’ve scooped tons and tons of squid, the boat heads back to Morro Bay to unload.

“We are unloading for Del Mar Seafoods. They are one of the larger producers of calamari in California,” said DeGarimore.

For Giovanni DeGarimore. the process is like a harvest. The tanks on the boat are connected to a suction tube that moves the squid onto a conveyer belt. The squid are then dumped into bins and iced.

Watch the story and read the article here.

Study finds eating salmon weekly can cut rheumatoid arthritis risk in half

Eating fish such as salmon at least once a week could halve the risk of developing rheumatoid arthritis, a new study has claimed.

The findings stem from a study of more than 32,000 Swedish women and offer another reason to follow the established dietary advice of regularly consuming fish for good health.

Researchers said the benefits of fishy diet are because it is rich in omega-3, which is said to protect both the heart and the brain.

A research team at Sweden’s Karolinska Institute analysed the dietary habits of 32,000 women, all of whom were born between 1914 and 1948 and were followed from 2003 to 2010.

Participants provided information on their diet, height, weight, parenthood status and educational achievements, as well as recording the frequency and amounts of various foods they ate, including several types of oily and lean fish.

A total of 205 women were diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis during the follow-up period and the researchers discovered that a high dietary intake of omega-3 fatty acids – which are found in fish such as salmon and fresh tuna – was associated with a reduced risk of the autoimmune disease.

Read the full story here.

New grant to “fill gap” in sardine stock assessment

New aerial surveys of sardines off Southern California will address fishermen’s concerns that sardine abundance estimates are effectively “missing California fish.”

Collaborative Fisheries Research West has awarded a $16,000 grant to a California sardine industry group to help pay for two spotter-pilot surveys. The first survey is being flown this summer and the second will occur in the spring of 2014.

The project’s leaders hope to use digitally enhanced photos of fish schools taken during the flights to develop a scientifically rigorous method for calculating sardine abundances. If this can be done, they will ask the Pacific Fishery Management Council, which manages the Pacific sardine fishery with NOAA Fisheries, to consider including California aerial survey data into its future stock assessments, from which harvesting limits are set.

Read the full article here.

California Department of Fish and Wildlife pilot Tom Evans (left) flies transects while spotter Devin Reed (right) identifies sardine schools, which are then photographed. Credit: K. Lynn/CDFW

Environmental cost of conservation victories

In recent years, Marine Protected Areas (MPA), where fishing is severely restricted or not allowed, have become the Holy Grail of marine conservation for both nongovernmental organizations and governments. In the United States, the Papahānaumokuākea Marine National Monument in the NW Hawaiian Islands became the first large-scale reserve closed to fishing in 2006 (1). This reserve is 90% the size of California and was followed by the Pacific Remote Islands Marine National Monument, about half the size of California, in 2009 (2). In total, the United States has established MPAs 19-times the size of California or roughly the area of the Continental United States.

The United States is not alone. The South Georgia and South Sandwich Islands Marine Protected Area in British sub-Antarctic waters is roughly 2.5-times the area of California, and most recently Australia has declared its economic zone in the Coral Sea a no-take area of 3.1 million square kilometers, an area eight times the size of California. All of these areas are heralded as great conservation victories and the Convention on Biodiversity has set a target of 10% of the ocean protected by 2020.

Are these indeed victories? Not necessarily. I suggest it is likely that the world’s environment is actually worse off once such victories are evaluated globally.

Read the full article here.

New Posters Highlight Local CA Seafood

Many of us may be pretty clueless about what fishermen catch off our coast, the gear they use, or the species that are farmed.

To help educate the public, California Sea Grant has created four regional posters that highlight local, commercially caught and farmed marine seafood.

The posters are available free for download and printing at Discover California Fisheries.

Read the full story here.

A convenient truth: 90% of the tunas are gone!

Last week, I had the privilege of presiding over the defense of the Ph.D. dissertation of Maria José Juan-Jordá in La Coruña, Spain. Maria José is a bright young researcher and has already published several chapters of her dissertation in the peer-reviewed literature.

The first chapter in her dissertation(1) is the last in a series of peer-reviewed scientific papers that demonstrate that the combined biomass of large oceanic predators (mostly tunas) has not declined by 90% as stated in another scientific paper ten years ago.

The 90% decline figure came from an analysis published in 2003 which concluded that “large predatory fish biomass today is only about 10% of pre-industrial levels” [Myers and Worm, 2003(2)].  Those analyses relied heavily upon catch rates from a single fishing gear type (longline) and aggregated catch across species to estimate trends in “community biomass”. The paper quickly became high-profile in the tuna world. Many environmental groups embraced it as proof that all tunas, not just the bluefins, were in serious trouble. On the other hand, tuna scientists who were actually conducting stock assessments, especially for tropical tunas knew immediately that the 90% number was totally wrong.

Over the next few years, a number of peer reviewed publications(3,4,5,6,7,8) showed that the conclusions in Myers and Worm (2003) were fundamentally flawed. Two of the most important reasons for this are: The aggregation of data, and the use of data from a single fishing method. The end result is that the 90% decline is an overestimate. This process of rebuttal is a natural part of the way science develops. Sometimes scientists reach conclusions that are wrong, for whatever reason, and other scientists discover flaws and point to them. A paper, once published, is not necessarily immortal.

Nevertheless, the notion of 90% global demise of tuna populations is still out there. It is repeated in many consumer guides published by various environmental groups that want to influence market preferences. It also pops up elsewhere: Earlier this year, I visited the web site of a newly-formed commission that aims to improve governance of ocean resources, and I was surprised to see the 90% number mentioned there. A colleague of mine who also noticed it said he was “disappointed that one of the most rebutted fisheries paper of all time continues to raise its head.”

Read the full story here.

Saving Seafood Special Report: U.S. Seafood: Ratings and Realities

As the National Park Service implements seafood guidelines for its vendors Saving Seafood examines the value, limitations, and pitfalls of third party ratings and certifications.

(Saving Seafood) August 1, 2013 — When the National Park Service (NPS) announced it would utilize third party seafood ratings and certification programs to set guidelines for vendors offering seafood options within U.S. National Parks, the agency revived a debate surrounding the eco-certification of U.S. seafood. Tomorrow, NPS is meeting with NOAA in an attempt to reconcile concerns and ensure that its new sustainable seafood guidelines aren’t detrimental to fishermen, processors, and consumers alike.

In June, the National Park Service (NPS) announced a new initiative to provide healthier and more sustainable food options in national parks across the United States. As part of the program, NPS created guidelines for “sustainable seafood,” stating that parks will “provide only [seafood options] that are ‘Best Choices’ or ‘Good Alternatives’ on the Monterey Bay Aquarium’s Seafood Watch list, certified sustainable by the Marine Stewardship Council (MSC), or identified by an equivalent program that has been approved by the NPS.”

In response, John Connelly, President of the National Fisheries Institute (NFI), wrote a letter to NPS, in which he asked that the Agency reconsider their guidelines. He stated that “any fish caught in U.S. waters is already ‘certified sustainable,’ based on rigorous NOAA oversight and does not need additional certifications.” His point speaks to the strict conservation standards in the Magnuson-Stevens Act (MSA), which are enforced by NOAA.

The Seafood Coalition, an ad hoc group representing members of the seafood industry across the U.S., followed up with their own letter. In it they asked: “Why would the NPS limit its vendors to those whose products are deemed sustainable by outside interests while ignoring [NOAA’s] FishWatch, an existing and proven program?”

Read the full story here.