Swampy and crew had a good day on Tuesday. "Evening Willy,
Had a great couple days fishing, always good to get down there with some nice weather. Tues was a good day with limits although nothing big came over the rails. Weds was MUCH slower with one keeper and a couple shorts boated. Bait wasn’t too tough to find which was nice.
Saw that you put Fast Eddy on a real nice fish. Can’t wait to see the size on that one.
Swampy." So here's the picture of Swampy's damn good day. Nine halibut is a day well played. He caught all these fish in one pretty small place. The next day he caught only one there. It looked like the spot was fished out. But then....
Some of that warm water from Fort Bragg slid down here. Gage tried yesterday and caught nothing. About half the boats out there did the same. The other half caught albacore, yellowfin, bigeye, and a marlin. Mostly albacore, but still. 38º 23' by 123º 55' was the center of the area of most of the effort, successful and otherwise. The water seems to be sliding further south, so a look before running would be a good idea.
Your observation of old halibut carrying anthropogenic scars does suggest that there are fewer fish in the sea than many anglers want to imagine. It also suggests that recreational anglers have a significant impact on the Tomales Bay halibut population.
ReplyDeleteCongrats Eddie on the huge halibut!
ReplyDeleteSwampy was that fish bigger than yours from a few weeks ago? I think yours was 39#.....
ReplyDeleteI don't follow suggestions very well.
Outlaw
Nice to see big halibut, but sadly agree with Mr Bland's comment seeing mainly barely legal halibut being harvested last couple months. Having fished off Pt Reyes area since late 80's, also note the massive decline in big lings and rockfish as well as did not see nearly as many large perch being caught on beach last few years. Too many folks pressuring area taking everything they land might want to think about taking what they really need before authorities dial down limit sizes yet again...
ReplyDeleteOutlaw, that was a 36 so Eddie beat it by one. Not huge on suggestions here either.
ReplyDeleteSwampy.
Tilly, well said. Some of those rock fish are over 100 years old and have lived on the same rock all their life. Fish that same rock frequently it takes a long time for it to "regrow" big fish in spite of excellent production. It is a numbers deal. Our ever increasing population is putting increasing pressure on all our resources; including ourselves.
ReplyDeleteUsing a picture of a halibut with a scar to propound a chicken-little-the-sky-is-falling-doomsday-scenario suggests a mindset predisposed to denigrate sportfishing. If you want to use anecdotal evidence to make broad speculations then please include the overabundance of SF bay halibut in your sample.
ReplyDeleteIf you are worried about pressure on resources then consider all the fish heads and carcasses that are wasted. If people were really hungry those resources would never hit the dumpster. You know what I mean, we’ve all had (I hope) pleasant conversations at the fish cleaning table with Chinese and Vietnamese friends who know what do with those “scraps”.
Next time I suggest saying something like “NICE FISH!”
Harvest Time: well said, come on by sometime and say hi if we haven’t already met.
ReplyDeleteEquating rockfish, lingcod, halibut, surf perch etc. harvest/recruitment is not biologically correct.
NICE FISH!
Harvest Time, I'm so glad you brought up the issue of tossing out fish carcasses, on which I've commented here before. It kills me to see wasted heads, carcasses and guts, and I will gladly pull fresh discards from the fish dumpster.
ReplyDeleteI'll briefly share what I do with my fish: I bake almost every head and carcass, then scrape off the meat. (The only exceptions are smaller rockfish or cabezon carcasses.) I boil the bones and heads for stock, then bury the bottom-of-the-pot sludge in the garden. I freeze (and cook) most rockfish whole so I don't have to fillet them to begin with or use more plastic bags. The gills and guts of halibut, rockfish, cabs, lings, etc are too vile to eat, in my opinion, so I make them into liquid fertilizer, but with other species, I salt their innards and make fish sauce. (Chinook salmon garum is out of this world.)
A friend of mine has used the stomach linings from lingcod for some dish or other, and I know from experience that certain fish livers are good. Just beware of those bile sacks!
Nice fish.
I forgot -- salt those roe sacs for bottarga! The stuff lasts for years, and the flavor, for a while anyway, gets stronger. I've found lingcod bottarga to be the best. For those of you catching tuna, consider that traditional Italian bottarga is made with the roe of mullet and bluefin tuna. I assume albacore and white sea bass have whopper roe sacs to make use of, too, but I don't often get my hands on those fish. (Salmon eggs are too big and oily to make into bottarga, but they can be cured and eaten.)
ReplyDeleteCabezon roe will supposedly make you sick.
Alistair, thank you for your amicable responses. My daughter's father in law is Azorean and I've learned to enjoy dumpster salmon, fish head soup, fried ling backbones and collars, etc. Now my gringo daughter asks for fish heads too.
ReplyDeleteRegarding the (usually Asian) people collecting carcasses at the fish cleaning table, in conversation I've discovered they are not there because they are poor (although some WERE poor). They are typically professionals (doctors, engineers, etc.) or their children are.
Bums won't harvest this resource because it involves work and they are busy hustling handouts.
Poor people don't seem to be interested. Maybe because they suck up multiple streams of welfare bennies.
I'm not sure how income affects people's fishing habits or energy levels, but I think people who harvest fish parts from dumpsters just know what's good to eat.
ReplyDeleteI'll sign off before I get started about people who throw away their fish skins!
Yes Alastair, and as the great Euell Gibbons instructed us in the 1970's "many parts of a Pine Cone are also edible", with the current direction of food prices I might start eating them too!
ReplyDelete