Rockfish Tagging in the San Juan Islands

[lokidog]

As most may know, I live in the San Juans.  I am part of a Community Science Group called KWIAHT. One of our fish projects is to use a beach seine to collect, and release, juvenile Chinook salmon for a diet study.

However, the leader of the group has other scientific permits available, one happens to be a permit for tagging Rockfish.  Since we catch a lot of Rockfish while fishing for Lingcod, Cabezon, and Greenling, I managed to get myself put on the permit for doing some tagging.  Hopefully, this will help show that the populations of Quillback and Copper Rockfish are sufficient to resume the limited season that we have enjoyed in the past.

I will be tagging Rockfish with small spaghetti tags.  They are a dorsal fin tag that have a number on them.  If anyone happens to catch one, please do not remove the tag, simply record the number, date, location, and length of the fish and contact me (edprairiecreek@gmail.com) or Russel Barsh (info in attached article).  The article, however, is a stock release from a few years ago.  I will be tagging all Rockfish caught, except those with "endangered" status (not that we actually catch many of these anyways unlike what the state wants people to think, three in ten years of fishing out here), and will be tagging in areas other than the south end of Lopez.

Please give as accurate of a gps location as possible, this info will not be publicly shared as I already know where the fish was caught previously. 

http://www.islandssounder.com/news/378185781.html#

Thanks and Good fishing!

[Widgeondeke]

Well let's go fishing and hope for a tagged fish. 

Good on ya Loki

[lokidog]

Couldn't buy a fish to stick a tag on Friday.      

[lokidog]

Finally got a couple of Rockfish to tag, two Coppers.  These were caught and released in a very popular Lingcod spot.  No lings for me though on the way home from subbing on Lopez though.

[Becky]

That sounds like fun!

[carpsniperg2]

Cool stuff!

[RadSav]

We used to take a group from the University out of Depoe Bay to tag shallow reef rock fish a couple times a year.  They sure had a lot of fun!  One flat day we snuggled up to a wash rock off Cape Fowlweather and tagged 22 Red Irish Lord.  Those kids thought they had died and gone to heaven.  Most had never seen one outside an aquarium.

[Skyvalhunter]

Good luck with Kuwait!!

[h2ofowlr]

How do I volunteer for this program.  I think we caught 16 or so rockfish last week.  Using swim baits and worm jigs seems to up the catch on those while targeting lings.

[Gobble Doc]

Nice work with your efforts.  What do they think is currently the biggest threat to the rockfish.  I remember in the 80s when it wasn't difficult to jigging for a few while ling fishing.  Found this quote from an article below as a reminder of earlier times:


"Looking at Puget Sound today, it’s hard to imagine the days when local wharves were crowded with fishing boats. But between 1920 and 1990, local seiners, draggers, gill-netters and longliners landed nearly 700 million pounds of groundfish — anything that’s not salmon or shellfish.

When one species went bust, there always seemed to be another to take its place. The latest target was rockfish, which sport and commercial fishermen latched onto in the 1970s after tribes won the right to half the region’s salmon. Most bottom trawling in Puget Sound was banned by the late 1980s, but not before three rockfish species were so decimated they made the endangered species list this year."

[lokidog]

How do I volunteer for this program.  I think we caught 16 or so rockfish last week.  Using swim baits and worm jigs seems to up the catch on those while targeting lings.

Ya gotta be connected....   

Gobble Doc, I think the Sound is still trying to recover from the draggers and the habitat destruction (spawning areas maybe).  The state thinks there is a huge bycatch by us shallow water fishermen, but the reality is the halibut fishers probably catch more of the endangered ones.

[elkfins]

Good on you for doing this.  I've gone on the WDFW rockfish tagging trips out of Westport before.  One day, 8 of us fishing caught over 1100 rockfish in about 8 hours of fishing... All were blacks with a couple of blues mixed in but what a fun day.

One of the biggest obstacles to recovering the endangered rockfish is the fact that they are extremely slow growing.  A 10lb canary or yelloweye will take many years to get that big.

[seth30]

Thank you for doing this Loki  

[Limhangerslayer]

Sounds fun!  In six years fishing over there I've only caught one black rockfish, but tons of copper, China, and quillbacks.  This past weekend shrimpping we only got three keeper lings, but thirty or forty rocks.

[lokidog]

Sounds fun!  In six years fishing over there I've only caught one black rockfish, but tons of copper, China, and quillbacks.  This past weekend shrimpping we only got three keeper lings, but thirty or forty rocks.

I've never caught a Black Rockfish here.  There are certainly plenty of Coppers and Quillbacks, enough for a season.  I wish they would at least do a ten fish a season punch card or something like that.  I tagged number 020 today, lost about a 40" ling when it bit me off after its third run and landed a just legal one.