Squid Studies: Scientists Seeking and Savoring Squid

William Gilly, a professor of biology at Stanford University's Hopkins Marine Station, embarked on new expedition this month to study jumbo squid in the Gulf of California on the National Science Foundation–funded research vessel New Horizon. This is his second blog post about the trip.

By William Gilly

SEA OF CORTEZ— As we moved up the Gulf towards Guaymas, we continued to prepare our equipment. Actually, this will be a never-ending focus for the next two weeks. A research cruise in most cases is a creation in progress, and 'equipment' in our case ranges from Brad Seibel's industrial-scale plumbing system for keeping big squid alive during experiments to our collection of fishing gear to catch squid. Everything will need constant, meticulous attention.

We arrived in Guaymas mid-afternoon and collected the rest of our party by 7 pm and immediately headed out to deep water about 10 miles offshore for our first exploratory squid jigging session. We arrived around 10:00 pm at the chosen site where a finger-like canyon poked back toward Guaymas. We immediately began to catch squid, and this had a predictable effect. We believe that catching a squid automatically triggers joyful exuberance. We have seen this phenomenon hundreds of times over the last decade. If there is photo of someone frowning while holding up a squid for the camera, we would like to see it. We doubt such an image exits.

Within an hour or so we collected our target sample of 20 to 30 squid. They were lined up sequentially on deck, measured, weighed, sexed and assessed for stage of maturity. This is information is simple but vital for two main reasons.

First, it is necessary to confirm the size of animals being sampled by the scientific sonar system on board that is being used by the Oregon State group. Acoustic data collected shows the depth where the squid and their prey are, and it can also be used to calculate numbers of squid or biomass – but only if you know how large the squid are that are being sampled acoustically. This is standard fare for acoustic assessment of fin-fish fisheries around the world, but use of such methods with squid is much less widespread. Kelly Benoit-Bird's team from Oregon State is doing pioneering work in this area, and her insights and creativity were recognized with a MacArthur award in 2010.

Read the rest at Scientific American.

LAT looks for surprising numbers to track possible fishing recovery

By Rosland GammonLike its Gulf Coast counterpart, the fishing industry in California has faced hard times. But it doesn’t have an oil spill to blame. Instead, a low population of salmon prompted a three-year ban on fishing. Alana Semuels of the Los Angeles Times takes her audience aboard Duncan MacLean’s boat as he goes out for the first time after the ban was lifted. She writes:“As dawn breaks on a recent morning, he sits at the helm of his 43-foot wooden boat, the Barbara Faye, guiding it past yachts and pleasure cruisers, two break walls and a beacon. But his enthusiasm to be fishing again is tempered by anxiety over what he will catch.”Read the rest of the story here. 

Oceana Twists Truth to Further Agenda

 Oceana’s Geoff Shester recently penned an op-ed in The Santa Cruz Sentinel alleging that forage fish harvesting is out of control and must be reigned in.  The only problem with his opinion:  the “facts”.  They are, in fact, not accurate, but instead reflect an agenda.Below, I’ve highlighted Mr. Shester’s false claims and followed them with a dose of reality: • “Thirty years ago forage species accounted for 40 percent of California’s commercial fish landings by weight.  Today, with big fish gone, forage landings have soared to 85 percent”In 1981, a moratorium was in effect prohibiting sardine fishing, and tunas dominated California landings, totaling more than 40 percent of the California catch.  The tuna canning industry based in San Diego, then the tuna capitol of the world, was driven out of California beginning in the mid-1980s, due in large measure to unfair competition from foreign water-packed imports and the excessive cost of doing business in the Golden State.  Those ‘big fish’ weren’t gone from the ocean, however, they were just not landed in California.The sardine resource made a dramatic recovery beginning in the late 1970s, with the advent of a warm-water oceanic cycle.  Resource managers reopened the fishery in 1985, but this time around, they enacted strict harvest limits coupled with environmental triggers.  The resource was declared fully recovered in 1999 when the population exceeding one million metric tons.  But the harvest rate was capped at 10 percent after subtracting 150,000 mt off the top of the biomass estimate to account for forage needs.  The stock appears to have entered another natural decline and biomass estimates have dropped sharply.  Which brings up another allegation: • “…Overfish the forage and the rest of the marine species are in trouble…but that is exactly what is happening in California today.  Pacific sardines have declined 70 percent in the past decade, and market squid are being fished at record levels.  California fisheries, like salmon, rockfish and tuna, are depleted and in dire need of recovery.”Regarding sardine, the conservative biomass estimate does not measure transboundary stocks in Canada and Mexico, but it does count landings from those countries, and those have declined; but coastwide harvest guidelines, including Washington and Oregon, as well as California, have also declined precipitously – from 152,000 mt in 2007 to 40,000 mt in 2011.The market squid statement also is calculated to confuse.California’s ocean has exhibited incredible productivity in the past two years, producing the highest grey whale count on record, resurgent rockfish stocks and a rebounding salmon fishery.  Market squid also thrived in these productive ocean conditions, but the fishery did not hit ‘record levels’.  In fact precautionary management has established a maximum harvest cap, intended to prevent overexploitation.  The fishery reached it and was closed before the end of the year.  A post-season survey of the squid spawning grounds revealed large aggregations of squid spawning nearly everywhere, well beyond end of the normal spawning cycle.The squid life cycle runs from birth to death after spawning in nine short months or less, and abundance is driven primarily by environmental cycles. To maintain a sustainable fishery, The Department of Fish and Game instituted weekend fishing closures, allowing squid to spawn untouched for 30 percent of the week, and implemented marine reserves in more than 30 percent of traditional fishing grounds in central and southern California.  In addition, the fishery management plan approved in 2004 reduced the fleet by more than half.California fisheries are by no means depleted, they are managed strictly by both the state and federal government (that’s why landings have appeared to decline – more fish are left in the ocean!).  Rockfish and salmon are managed under the ecosystem-based fishery management mandate of the federal Magnuson Act, with precautionary annual catch limits to prevent overfishing. • “A recent federal study found that top ocean predators off California have declined by more than 50 percent since 2003.  Removing their source of food is like taking medicine away from the patient.  Traditional fisheries management concentrates on single species …” The study, presumably the first draft of the “California Current Integrated Ecosystem Assessment”, does not yet include the area south of Point Conception – a critical omission acknowledged by the scientific team.  The draft IEA was submitted to the Pacific Fishery Management Council as an example.  Clearly, with data from a significant part the ocean missing, conclusions are not ready for ‘prime time’.The IEA was developed to assist the Council in developing its Ecosystem-based Management Plan for the entire California Current – which will inform all the other fishery management plans, which now include ecosystem considerations themselves.  (The Coastal Pelagic Species plan has considered forage needs for more than a decade!)Similar innuendos and misstatements run throughout the article, but I will touch on just one more: • “The question of fishing sustainably is a matter of political will.  That’s why a strong coalition of conservationists, fishermen and seafood businesses that want to see … healthy California oceans are supporting Assembly Bill 1299 that emphasizes the critical role that forage species play…”A vast majority of California’s fishing communities, including municipalities, port districts, recreational and commercial fishing groups and individuals, seafood companies and knowledgeable fishery scientists, believe California already fishes sustainably;  indeed, California Current fisheries are acknowledged as having one of the lowest harvest rates in the world.This super-majority is very much opposed to AB 1299, seeing that it embodies the same type of confusing, captious policy statements as contained in the ‘forage fishing must be controlled’ article.To be clear, the majority of California fishing-related interests oppose the bill for the following reasons: 

• A multi-million dollar boondoggle:  AB 1299 is a solution in search of a problem.  This bill fails to acknowledge and integrate all the existing protections for forage species that now exist in both state and federal law. Whales, sea lions, and sea birds are thriving, providing clear evidence that state and federal forage species policies are working. Moreover, there are no ‘reduction’ fisheries in California, nor fishmeal plants, so the alleged threat from increasing forage fish production for aquaculture does not exist here: fisheries are strictly regulated.

• Fails to recognize existing efforts: California has done a good job managing forage fish – far better than most other states and countries.  In addition to strict harvest rates and other management measures, the Marine Life Protection Act has implemented no-take reserves, including many near bird rookeries and haul out sites to protect forage for other marine life.  To start as if from scratch is both redundant and disrespectful of that management history.

• Requires non-existent funding and staff time: Department of Fish & Game (DFG) is already enormously underfunded and understaffed for its existing tasks. The increased demand for Department research and management resources that this bill would create cannot be met without sacrificing resources for programs that are actually necessary.

• Duplicates federal and state efforts: Oceana, the bill author, admitted at a public forum that California’s Marine Life Management Act already provides a science-based process to manage forage species. The federal Pacific Fishery Management Council is currently developing its California Current Ecosystem Management Plan, which will cover the entire West Coast, not just California state waters, with objectives similar to those in AB 1299. We encourage California to collaborate with the PFMC, which does not require legislation.

• Places impossible standard on fisheries: The May 27 amendments to AB 1299 camouflage the millions needed to do specified research and make findings, yet still require new fishery management plans and amendments to fishery plans to be consistent with the new policy after January 1, 2012.  The new policy objective requires ecosystem-based management that “recognizes, prioritizes, accounts for, and incorporates the ecological services rendered by forage species”.  This implies setting explicit allocations for birds and mammals off the top of all fishery harvest plans  – and much of this information is not available.  Although final amendments in Appropriations Committee removed specific language, the threat of restriction is still inherent in this policy.

 AB 1299 still requires millions in new money for DFG to prove that a fishery had no negative impacts before allowing it to operate. This is money that could be going to schools, health care, and other state programs with proven needs. 

• AB 1299 does not consider best available science, and could actually impede ecosystem-based management. AB 1299 will not protect forage species as virtually all range far beyond California state waters, but the policy proposed in this bill could severely restrict California fishermen unnecessarily and unfairly.

Anchovy, sardine populations not at risk

The Santa Cruz Sentinel recently ran a column by D.B. Pleschner, executive director of the California Wetfish Producers Association.  It's reproduced in its entirety below:

By D.B. Pleschner

"In Monterey Bay, and around the world, little fish are in big trouble," wrote Sascha Zubryd in her May 13 Sentinel article.The article reported on a new study by Stanford researchers, who expressed surprise that small coastal pelagic fish, such as sardine and anchovy, were as subject to collapse as large predator fish.But this isn't news to scientists well-versed in the cycles of these coastal pelagic species. In fact, the first academic research paper that said essentially the same thing appeared in the 1880s, more than 100 years ago.What's more, in California, these species are not in trouble.When asked about the Stanford study, Dr. Richard Parrish, a former member of the West Coast Coastal Pelagic Species Management Team and recently retired from the National Marine Fisheries Service, said, "I am always amazed when academic scientists publish papers on fisheries and are surprised by things that were well-known and published decades ago in fisheries journals."The brief answer is yes, small fishes can be and often are overfished," he added. "The problem is confounded with environmental fluctuations that occur with a periodicity which suggests that you can believe what your grandfather tells you, but you cannot believe what your father tells you."Sardines are a classic example.The storied Pacific sardine collapse in the 1940s was widely blamed on overfishing, but decades later scientific studies of core samples taken from the deep anaerobic trench in the ocean off Southern California revealed layers of sardine scales and layers of anchovy scales corresponding with oceanic cycles. Warm-water cycles favored sardines and cold-water cycles favored anchovies. The bottom line: the sardine population would have declined even without fishing pressure.Such findings led Dr. Parrish and other members of the management team to design a new, ultra precautionary harvest strategy for sardines when the population was declared fully recovered in 1999.And the same precautionary principles apply to other coastal pelagic stocks as well, in light of their known cycles of abundance and importance in the ecosystem as forage for other marine life.Today's fishery management of coastal pelagic species in California and along the West Coast portion of the California Current Ecosystem is acknowledged as the most precautionary in the world, one of only a few areas deemed to be "sustainable" by internationally recognized scientists Rebuilding Global Fisheries, Science 2009.The basic management strategy adopted a decade ago for coastal pelagic species harvested in California and on the West Coast maintains at least 75 percent of the fish in the ocean to ensure a resilient core biomass. And the protection rate for sardines is even higher -- about 90 percent.In addition, the state of California is implementing a network of no-take marine reserves throughout state waters. Reserves established at specific bird rookery and marine mammal haul-out sites, for example near Año Nuevo, the Farallon Islands, and the Channel Islands in Southern California, are explicitly intended to protect species such as anchovy, sardines and market squid as forage for other marine life.Recently, concern over increased utilization of small fishes worldwide has grown in response to a perceived increase in demand for fishmeal for an expanding aquaculture industry.But again, this risk does not apply to California, as reduction fisheries and fishmeal plants no longer exist in the Golden State.In Monterey and California overall, people can rest assured that the little fish are not in trouble here; rather these coastal pelagic species are harvested sustainably, and they still contribute enormous benefits to the socio-economic and cultural well-being of our harbor communities. 

Fishery Landings by West Coast County, 2006-2010

Maps were created (view pdf) that present rankings by west coast counties according to the major “management groups” (grouping individual species codes) used in the PacFIN database in terms of ex-vessel revenue for the recent 5-year period, 2006-2010.These management groups accord with the four Pacific Council fishery management plans (coastal pelagic species, groundfish, highly migratory species, and salmon) and four additional categories (crab, other, salmon, shellfish, and shrimp).The data were obtained by a query grouping landings by county codes in the database. The PacFIN county codes were then matched to FIPS county codes for use in ArcGIS. (The PacFIN county table includes several codes that are not counties, e.g., “Columbia River below Bonneville Dam.”In data preparation revenue for all these codes were grouped into a single record, which is not displayed in the figures or the table below.)Counties were used as the geographic units for two reasons. First, counties are a useful geographic unit for producing choropleth maps. Second, grouping by county makes it easier to compare landings data to demographic data (available from the census or other sources) in future analyses.Read the post at the Pacific Fishery Management Council's site.

Anybody With a Boat Want To Visit 130 West, 44 North?

By Danna StaafWhile last year's market squid bounty continues into the 2011 fishing season, the market squid's larger cousin is playing hard to get. The Humboldt or jumbo squid--you remember, our hungry friends that grow up to five feet long and eat everything they can wrap their arms around--makes a habit out of making headlines, whether it's invading or invisible. This year, it's the latter."Catches of jumbo squid in 2009-2010 seemed limitless," reports Frank Hartzell of the Mendocino Beacon. But they've been conspicuously absent in 2011.Read the rest here.

Where farmers, fishermen agree

Brett Baker

Thursday, May 5, 2011Here's something that would surprise anyone tracking the heavily politicized debate over California's water, fish and farms: Many of the state's farming and fishing communities generally agree on a sustainable plan for the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta.These united farming and fishing communities have mutual interests and goals. They know that the delta's agricultural economy and California's king salmon runs all depend on a healthy delta; and a healthy delta, in turn, requires adequate freshwater flows.You probably wouldn't know about this alliance from reading the newspaper, however. But the 250 people attending the Farms & Salmon Summit in Antioch on April 27 served as a testament to our common views - and to common sense. And there are thousands of others like us across the state and the West.Read the rest from The San Francisco Chronicle. 

Plenty more fish in the sea?

New method for measuring biomass reveals fish stocks are more stable than widely believed

Fish and marine species are among the most threatened wildlife on earth, due partly to over exploitation by fishing fleets. Yet there are differences in assessing trends in worldwide fishing stocks which, researchers writing in Conservation Biology argue, stem from inappropriate use of time trends in catches.  “Estimates of fishery status based on catches suggest that around 30% of fisheries are collapsed and 70% are overexploited or collapsed,” said lead author Dr Trevor Branch from the University of Washington in Seattle. “Our assessment shows that these data are seriously biased, and that instead we should be looking at biomass data.Biomass data from scientific stock assessments indicated a much smaller proportion in these categories (12% collapsed, 26% overexploited or collapsed), and that status trends are stable. Our analysis suggests that in most regions fisheries management has led to stabilization, and even recovery, of fished populations.” “Species which are targeted by fishing fleets are divided into stocks, a division of species into units based on political boundaries, genetic divergence, and biological characteristics,” said Branch. “The depletion of these stocks has important implications for ecosystem biodiversity; however methods of measuring depletion vary greatly.” Dr Branch’s team considered stocks being “collapsed” or “overexploited” on the basis of catch and biomass data. Collapse is defined as biomass of less than 10% of unfished levels while over exploitation is defined by the governments of the United States and Australia as biomass below 50% of biomass that would produce maximum sustained catches.  These reference points are widely used in fisheries management, either as management targets or as limits not to be exceeded. Previous methods for assessing status were on the basis of catch trends, however, methods based on biomass data find much lower percentages that are collapsed or over exploited, and relatively stable future trends. “Our study found the status of stocks worldwide based on catch trends to be almost identical to what would be expected if catches were randomly generated with no trend at all,” said Branch, “and that most classifications of collapse on the basis of catch data are not true collapses but are due to taxonomic reclassification, regulatory changes in fisheries, and market changes.” Where biomass data are available, this can be used to ground truth the catch trends; this shows that catch data greatly overestimates the percentage of stocks collapsed and overexploited. Although the team’s biomass data was primarily from industrial fisheries in developed countries, the status of these stocks estimated from catch data is similar to the status of stocks in the rest of the world estimated from catch data. “Instead of focusing on what we take out of the oceans (catches), we should be examining the actual state of the ecosystem (biomass data),” concludes Branch. “Catch data produce seriously biased estimates of what is going on in ocean ecosystems, and we need more effort expended on scientific surveys and stock assessments, especially in areas that are currently poorly assessed.” This paper is published in Conservation Biology. Fore more information contact Lifesciencenews@wiley.comThis e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it  +44 (0) 1243 770 375 Full Citation:  Branch TA, Jensen OP, Ricard D, Ye Y, Hilborn R, “Contrasting global trends in marine fishery status obtained from catches and from stock assessments”, Conservation Biology, March 2011, DOI