Innovative Rockfish Research Project Nets Good Will from Volunteer Anglers

February 6, 2006

Contact: John Stumbos, jdstumbos@ucdavis.edu, 530-754-7770

More than 200 anglers got to do something last summer that has become increasingly difficult - board a chartered recreational fishing boat and catch rockfish off the Marin coastline to their hearts' content.

These volunteer anglers took part in a study designed by California Sea Grant's Extension Program (SGEP) to shed new light on local populations of "rockfish" and other nearshore species such as lingcod, cabezon and kelp greenling. Rockfish is a collective term that refers to more than 60 species that inhabit the ocean close to the coast. Some deepwater rockfish such as boccacio, cowcod and canary rockfish have seen their numbers decline precipitously in the last decade, forcing federal and state fishery managers to restrict fishing opportunities for commercial and recreational anglers along the West Coast.

Graduate student Kristen Green (right) discusses identifying characteristics of a canary rockfish with Morgan Williams (left), a deckhand on the charter boat Superfish, and Peter St. John (center), a volunteer in an innovative study looking at populations of ocean rockfish.

"Tagging studies like this are an important method of understanding the health of fish populations in a given area," said Rick Starr, a SGEP marine advisor based at the Moss Landing Marine Laboratory. "What's different about this project is the volunteers we recruited to help us catch, tag and release fish."

The anglers caught about 5,000 rockfish during 25 outings in June and eight in September to a popular fishing area south of Bolinas called the Duxbury Reef. The fish were caught by jigging lures, shrimp flies or barbless hooks baited with squid or anchovies off the side of charter boats - the Salty Lady and Blue Runner of Sausalito and the Flying Fish, Super Fish and California Dawn of the East Bay. Starr and a group of Moss Landing graduate students identified each fish brought on board and then recorded its length, where it was caught, and its body condition. The slippery specimens were then tagged with a spaghetti-like wire that contains identifying information and a phone number for anglers to call when the fish are reeled in a second time.

"The success of this project is partly dependent upon the number of tags that we have returned," Starr said. "We are very interested in hearing from anglers that catch these tagged fish."

About 120 rockfish have been recaptured since the study began, mostly within a few miles of their initial tagging location. However, some rockfish have moved substantial distances. One was caught more than 17 miles away near the Farallon Islands. Another turned up in a live fish market in San Francisco, the wire tag apparently unnoticed by whoever caught it.

"Rockfish movements are interesting," Starr says. "They're like people. Most will live close to where they were raised, but a few will move across the country. Fish are the same way. Some are wanderers."

The most commonly caught species of the summer was black rockfish, accounting for 70 percent of the landings. Other species included cabezon, kelp greenling and more than a dozen rockfishes in a rainbow of colors and descriptions -- blue, yellow, canary, gopher, brown, vermilion, olive, china and yellowtail. "We're also seeing a lot of small lingcod," Starr said. "That tells me there's a good year-class coming along. This species is reproducing well."

But reports from the Pacific Fisheries Management Council, which sets policy for California, Oregon, Idaho and Washington, paint a troubling picture for certain nearshore species. For instance, the PFMC officially declared cowcod rockfish to be overfished in 2000. The Council is charged with restoring fish populations to 40 percent of pristine, unfished stock. In slow-growing species such as cowcod, that may take decades.

Bocaccio, often marketed to consumers as red snapper, is another commercially important species whose dwindling population estimates forced the California Department of Fish and Game (DFG) to restrict access through seasonal and area closures in different coastal waters. Until the mid-1980s, bocaccio was one of the most abundant rockfish species between Morro Bay and Fort Bragg.

The decline of fish like bocaccio and cowcod led the PFMC to close fishing for all rockfish species in deep water south of Cape Mendocino in June 2002. As a consequence of creating this rockfish conservation area, fishing pressures increased in nearshore areas like Duxbury Reef by concentrating commercial and recreational fishing boats into a smaller area of the ocean.

Many rockfish species are genetically wired to live to a ripe old age. Black rockfish can live for about 45 years. Cowcod can live to 100. Yelloweye rockfish in Alaska have been documented at 180 years. Longer-lived species mature later and are more susceptible to overfishing. Changes in ocean conditions wrought by global warming or El Nino also affect the reproductive success of many fish species, but Starr points out that rockfish have evolved a strategy to survive over the long haul.

These fish store a lot of fat and have low metabolic rates," he said. "A 50-year-old fish has already lived through six to eight El Ninos, so they're adapted to living through difficulty."

The Duxbury Reef Tagging Study grew out of a collaboration between Starr and Roger Thomas, skipper of the Salty Lady and president of the Golden Gate Fishermen's Association (an organization representing commercial passenger fishing vessels and marine recreational anglers along the central coast). Five years ago, the federal government declared the West Coast groundfish fishery overfished and established disaster funds for relief to fishermen. The pair developed and submitted a successful grant proposal to the Pacific States Marine Fisheries Commission and received $100,000 to do the innovative study with volunteer anglers and paid charter boats. Most of the volunteers were recruited through the Coastside Fishing Club, which provides anglers a forum for fisheries management and related issues on its Website.

Thomas and other fishermen believe there are more fish in some areas than resource managers say. They believe that research like the Duxbury Reef project will demonstrate this. "In the last couple of years, we've been experiencing a tremendous increase in fish," he said. "Fishing at the Farallons is better than I've ever seen it. It's absolutely unbelievable."

Flying Fish skipper Brian Guiles shared similar observations and concern for the health of the fishery. "We're not having a normal year," he said. "Rockfishing has been absolutely phenomenal this year. But we don't want to decimate a population. We want to find out something about it."

"More information about nearshore rockfish populations will be useful," Starr says. "Resource managers are doing the best they can with the information they have to develop required management plans that ensure conservation of nearshore species."

In the past, rock fishing provided a year-round alternative to salmon, albacore and other types of ocean sportfishing. It was a significant source of income for the charter boat fleet. For now, however, recreational anglers are restricted to fishing only five months out of the year in water between 10 and 20 fathoms (60 and 120 feet). "We always had rock cod in the past," Thomas laments. "There's only a limited amount of whale watching you can do."

On the rockfish trips last summer, volunteers enthusiastically engaged Starr and his graduate students in lively discussions about fish biology or shared stories about the one that got away. Some, like Oakland fisherman Peter St. John, have taken an active role in data collection. "I'm a shameless science groupie," he said while recording measurements on one outing in September.

Participating in the research has given anglers a sense of vested interest in the outcome of the study, something hoped for in the project design. "One of our objectives was to facilitate interaction among recreational anglers, the charter boat fleet and the scientific community," said Kristen Green, Starr's principal graduate student in the study. "I learned how important it is to work with these anglers who fish there all the time. How they view us is critical to how they view all scientists."

Plans are under way for an increased tagging effort this year. The scientists hope to tag an additional 3,000 fish over 10 days at Duxbury Reef and new areas north toward Pt. Reyes National Seashore. They'll also be examining other factors more closely -- such as distance from port and the influence of different undersea habitats -- on rockfish populations. At the end of the project, workshops will be held in Sausalito and Bolinas to share findings from the tagging studies.

"This has been a terrific project in many respects," Starr said. "Most importantly, it is bringing together researchers, agency scientists and fishermen toward a common goal - a healthy and sustainable fishery resource."