This paper is a discussion of the history and future of Harpoon Swordfishing in Southern California. It covers how the fishery operates and how it has been affected by the introduction of new technology and by other fishing methods. Also included is a discussion of the unlimited fishing pressure applied by the Mexican near shore Swordfish fleet. More importantly, the paper compares the current state of Swordfishing in California and Mexico with the collapse of the Swordfish industry in Chile. The parallels are too frightening to ignore when discussing the future of this fishery. They dramatically show how indiscriminant fishing techniques such as gillnetting and long lining destroy a priceless fishery resource. The conclusions offer some disturbing news. The recommendations offer stringent but necessary management tools for consideration.

HARPOONS…THE ORIGINAL ROD AND REEL!

"Harpoon Swordfishermen today, as in the past, use their eyes to find the fish. It follows that they see every kind of life that swims on or just below the surface while they fish. It also follows that when they see very little life swimming around their boat they know something is very definitely wrong. The boat is in the wrong place, or the life is gone!" Larry E. Mebust

INTRODUCTION and SUMMARY

THE CALIFORNIA HARPOON FISHERY for SWORDFISH

The Harpoon Swordfishery in California is a traditional fishery. It is documented as having been practiced by West Coast Indian fishermen dating back as far as 3,000 years. Modern commercial Harpoon fishing in California began around 1900 utilizing sail powered sloops or schooners. The gear in use today has changed little since then except for the materials from which it is made. With the advent of new fishing methods, harpoon swordfishing will probably never again be the primary way to catch swordfish; but it will always be the leading indicator, or bellwether, by which to measure the health of the stock and thus the performance of those who manage that stock.

TROUBLING LANDINGS DATA

Until the deployment of Drift Gillnets in the late 1970's, the harpoon was the primary gear type in use in California. Since the deployment of the Driftnet, the landing statistics indicate to us that a classic "boom/bust" scenario has already occurred in California's near shore fishery with swordfish landings steadily decreasing since they peaked in1985.

DRIFT GILLNETS AND LONGLINES ARE TOO EFFECTIVE

Unmanaged or under-managed fishing with both Drift Gillnets and Longlines has been proven to lead to overfishing and ultimately to failed fisheries. Our near shore fishery has for the past ten years, exhibited all classic signs of excessive fishing for swordfish and other species. These gear types have also been proven to produce unacceptable levels of by-catch and discarded catch. These gear problems must now be dealt with objectively; they can no longer be ignored. I tenaciously support every commercial fisherman's right to fish for a living and to feed his family. However, I believe that this right comes with the direct responsibility to fish in a manner that shows concern for the fish stock as well as the entire ecosystem.

THE WRITING IS ON THE WALL

The California/Mexico near shore fishery for swordfish parallels that of Chile in its evolution: Harpoons to Driftnets to Longlines. Chile began introducing stringent management measures far too late in the evolution to prevent the collapse of its swordfishery. The new measures may someday allow the rebuilding of the Chilean fishery, but for now it is commercially unviable. The recent introduction of Pelagic Longlines into our off shore fishery (outside the 200 mile Exclusive Economic Zone, EEZ) in California is the final requirement for us to evolve into a mirror image of Chile.

Hopefully the conservation and management measures evolving from the current efforts of the Council will preclude that evolution.

MORE EFFECTIVE MANAGEMENT IS REQUIRED

My specific concerns are itemized and quantified in this document, as are recommendations for change. New national and international conservation and management measures are desperately needed if swordfishing, and especially Harpoon swordfishing is to remain a commercially viable fishery in California.

THE CALIFORNIA HARPOON FISHERY for SWORDFISH

Today's harpoon swordfishery in California was clearly and in the main, accurately described from both a technical and historical stand point by ATILIO L. COAN JR., MARIJA VOJKOVICH, AND DOUG PRESCOTT in their paper, The California Harpoon Fishery for Swordfish, Xiphias gladius. The historical description in the introduction and many of the statistics utilized in the writing of our paper were obtained from this work. Credits for the usage of their information in are given and herein, their work is referred to as Coan et al, 1994. I disagree with some of Coan's conclusions regarding the California harpoon fishery and discuss these later.

Harpoon fishing pressure is limited by nature

Harpoon swordfishing in California is limited annually by two major factors. First, swordfish are only found in fishable numbers in the calmer waters of the Bight between June and November. This is due to the annual northwesterly push of the North Equatorial Counter Current. Secondly, the winter and spring weather in the area tends to be too rough to operate in with a harpoon pulpit extended. These two conditions levy a natural, seasonal closure on the harpoon fishery. The other gear types fish in all but the worst of weather conditions.

Boat / Airplane "team fishing"

The boat/airplane team harpoon fishery, as it is today, began to evolve in the early 1970's when airplanes were introduced. Initially, infighting between the purists and those intent on modernization caused the airplanes to be a very limited factor in the fishery for over ten years. The planes were banned by the DFG for one year during 1976. In 1984, airplanes were finally allowed full time in the fishery. This only occurred after many of the boats had been converted to fish drift gillnets. The modern, I believe technically correct, boat/plane team-fishing model for swordfishing never had a real opportunity to show what it could accomplish in the market place before the near shore swordfish stocks began to show a serious decline in numbers.

The harpoon swordfishery produces zero by-catch

By-catch in any fishery describes those non-targeted animals that are incidentally or accidentally taken by the fishing gear while fishing for the target species. Harpoon swordfishing produces absolutely zero by-catch! A harpooner intentionally takes every single fish landed by his boat.

Average weight of landed harpooned swordfish

Coan et al, 1994, describes the average landing weight of harpooned swordfish during the period 1981 - 1993 as being 85 kg (187.4 lbs.) and explains that they did not have total numbers of fish, only total weight with which to calculate the number. Coan's average is low when compared to average weight per fish data reported by harpoon boats from landing receipts. My calculations of annual average dressed weight per fish taken by harpoon over the past ten years averages approximately 90.7 kg (200lbs.). This varies from about 195lbs to well over 200lbs on a boat-to-boat basis over the same ten-year period. The primary reason for this higher average weight (than other gear types) is selectivity. Harpooners seldom take juvenile swordfish.

Intentional take of secondary species

Some harpoon boats take Mako sharks as a secondary species due to its readily marketable meat. Makos in the one hundred to one hundred fifty pound range tend to be the shark most likely to be taken due to the steak quality of that size fish. In recent years, however, sharks of this size are seldom seen in the Bight. My boat quit taking shark's altogether due to a combination of low price and the modern knowledge about the animals' limited ability to reproduce.

Erroneous harpooned shark landings disputed.

The data indicate that in the late 1960's sharks were not routinely targeted or landed by Harpooners (Coan et al, 1994); this is the norm for the fishery. Table 1 in Coan's work shows that between 1969 and 1974 harpooners landed only 53 Mako sharks, all in 1970. Beginning in 1977, the data show a massive increase in shark landings by harpooners including hundreds of metric tons of Thresher, Mako, Blue and other sharks.

These dramatic numbers are undoubtedly accurate, however harpooners did not take these sharks! The beginning of these landings coincides precisely with the beginning of the drift gillnet fishery. The driftnet fishery was originally licensed as an "Experimental near shore Shark fishery" targeting Threshers and Makos with swordfish as by-catch. By rule, swordfish landings could not exceed shark landings. Coan theorizes that those boats with both permits (harpoon and drift gillnet) simply assigned enough of their sharks to their harpoon catch in order to make their high percentage of swordfish landings appear legal.

At this writing, I understand that due to Coan's work, the Department of Fish and Game and NMFS both understand why these old figures are erroneous. They are, however, part of the record and I mention them for the benefit of others who may read this paper. This "unexpectedly high by-catch problem" must become a lesson learned for those who evaluate future requests for "experimental fisheries."

Harpooners service a demanding niche market

Harpooners have developed a specialty customer base in the high quality seafood restaurant market. The Department of Fish and Game licenses many of these first quality restaurants as fish receivers. A direct sale to this market produces better income for the fisherman. It rewards his efforts to deliver truly fresh fish to the end user, and assures the customer of a consistently high grade of product.

Only when the fisherman-direct market is satisfied do the harpooners begin to deliver to wholesale buyers. Even wholesale buyers will generally pay more per pound for the harpoon product than for swordfish caught by other gear types. As a general rule, when a harpooner calls a wholesale buyer to sell fish, those fish are already sold to restaurants by the time of delivery to the buyer. Harpooned swordfish are often referred to by the wholesalers as "cherries" thus acknowledging the high quality of the product.

Our markets demand top product quality

Harpooners pride themselves on the high quality of their product. This notable quality is due the handling of the fish after it is harpooned. Once aboard, the fish are bled immediately. This single action improves the color and quality of the meat markedly. (The meat from any fish that dies with its blood in the meat will be darker and stronger tasting than that from a fish which has been bled. Side by side, a steak from a bled fish appears pink or white, while a steak from a fish that died without being bled will appear brown in color.)

After bleeding, the fish are immediately finned, gutted, trimmed and the body cavity thoroughly scrubbed before they are placed in the refrigerated fish hold and iced down. The fish are re-iced after about 12 hours to replace the ice lost in the cooling process.

Most harpooners try to unload their fish within 1 to 3 days after catching them. Although refrigerated swordfish does hold very well, the harpoon customer base generally wants the fish as soon as they can have them.

Harpooning is a bellwether fishery

Harpooning on the California coast is a fishery in decline. This is because it is becoming more difficult to make a profit with every passing year. The foregoing statement poses the question: "why is it harder to be profitable"?

Coan's work states "competition from the more efficient drift gillnet fishery since 1980 has resulted in decreases in harpoon catches." I strongly disagree with this statement in two important ways. First, the term efficient cannot be applied to the use of gillnets to catch swordfish. They are certainly effective at catching sea animals, but efficiency requires getting the job done without creating damage. Secondly, harpooners do not and cannot compete with the drift net fishermen in numbers of fish caught! Harpooners pride themselves on catching and delivering only one thing - high quality fresh swordfish! They are, I believe, willing to live with a Catch Per Unit of Effort (CPUE) that I below that of the other available gear types in order to be selective. However, harpooners, myself included, must remain profitable to continue fishing.

The steadily decreasing catch levels and resulting limits on profitability result directly from a steadily declining stock of fish! It's simple: less fish available to catch = less fish caught = less profitability!

There is only one reason for this: the swordfish stocks have diminished due to excess fishing in the near shore waters of both Mexico and the Bight of California, our primary fishing grounds.

Harpooners only fish in the top layer of water where the fish fin or bask. It stands to reason that we only see a percentage of the fish in a given area on a given day. If the stock of fish in that area is healthy, we see plenty of fining fish. If the stock is small, we see very few. Unfortunately, even with the use of airplanes, "very few fish" is becoming the norm.

The near shore harpoon fishery for swordfish is in trouble because the near shore swordfish stocks are in trouble! We are the same bellwether that first forecast the demise of both the North Atlantic and Chilean swordfisheries - the Harpooners.

The U.S. drift gillnet boats are by no means completely responsible for this decline in the near shore stocks. The U.S. flagged driftnet boats are managed to an extent by the CDFG by means of time/area closures. The virtually unmanaged Mexican near shore drift gillnet/longline fleet has landed (and imported to the U.S.) all the swordfish it was capable of catching over the past 15 years. These Mexican landings must be included in any future studies of the health of near shore swordfish stock. The Mexican fleet must also be included by treaty or other means in any viable fisheries management plan affecting California based swordfishermen.

TROUBLING LANDINGS DATA

A NOTE ON DATA

The graphs in this section were created using thirty-nine years of landings data obtained from the NMFS database. It should be noted that an average of one metric ton per year of landings shown as "Harpoon" can be attributed to unknown gear types. These are the occasional landings made by purse seine boats and other gear types not normally associated with swordfish.

FIGURE 1

Actual harpoon landings - Figure 1

Figure 1 shows the record of landings by the California harpoon fleet for this thirty-nine year (39) period. At first glance the chart would indicate that swordfish just come and go haphazardly in the waters of the California Bight. There is no information to explain the low catch recorded for 1962 except to say, "the fish just didn't show up." An over reaction to mercury levels in some international fish stocks caused the 1971 dip; many boats just didn't fish that year. The 1976 dip was also primarily man-made due to airplanes being totally disallowed by the DFG for that year.

1978 - THE UNEXPLAINABLE YEAR

During this period came the fishing season that no one could have believed and many still don't -1978. The harpoon boats could go anywhere in the Bight of California and find between ten and twenty fining swordfish in any given day. They could return to the same little piece of water every day with the same results - more fish. From San Diego to Santa Cruz Island the ocean was alive with swordfish for the taking. Airplanes were the last thing on anyone's mind during this season. There is no harpooner alive today who, having experienced that season, won't tell you that it was a one in a million year. The current belief about 1978 is that it gave a one-season look at the large stock of swordfish that once populated the near shore waters of southern California and Mexico.

I have created a five-year moving average of harpoon landings to produce a long-term trend analysis of the data. In the interest of smoothing out the radical three year peak in the harpoon graph which was caused by the astounding landings in 1978, the actual data point for 1978 (1171 mt) was replaced with the arbitrary figure of five hundred metric tons (500 mt). This figure serves to acknowledge a great year without creating a misleading three-year peak for the harpoon fleet. The blue (diamond) aircraft data points are arbitrary and only serve to show limits and closures placed on aircraft use.

Airplanes - The key to the harpooners success

Even with limited ability to use spotter planes, the landings for the harpoon fishery were trending upwards. Experience dictates a harpoon boat with a spotter plane will catch approximately three times the swordfish than a boat with no airplane. This is due to the plane's ability to see sub-surface fish and those fining fish that are beyond binocular range. Airplanes were finally allowed into the fishery full time in 1984, one year before the drift gillnet fishery peaked and began a precipitous decline in landings.

Drift Gillnets - the new swordfishing gear - Figure 3

During the mid-1970's a few harpoon swordfishermen began to experiment with using drift gillnets to catch sharks. To say the least, this gear proved to be highly effective at catching anything that swam into it, especially sharks and swordfish. They were issued experimental gear permits as a shark fishery. This group of boats generally had drift net gear on the aft deck and a harpoon pulpit on the bow - the best of both worlds. The boats began fishing the nets in 1978, steadily increasing their annual catch of swordfish by an average of nearly five hundred metric tons (500 mt) per year by 1980. This success peaked in 1985 with landings of over twenty four hundred metric tons (2,400 mt) of swordfish alone.

This dramatic success was followed by an almost equally dramatic decline in landings beginning in 1986 when landings fell to just under seventeen hundred metric tons (>1,700 mt) beginning a precipitous slide. By 1991 annual drift net landings had fallen to less than eight hundred fifty two metric tons (>852 mt) for the fleet! This rise followed by a continuing decline, points toward a classic case of exceeding the maximum sustainable yield for a species in a given geographic area.

FIGURE 3

The graph (Figure 3) clearly shows a precipitous drop in swordfish landings beginning in 1986. It also clearly shows no signs of recovery for the near shore stock in the Bight. I am quite certain, although location of catch data is not available, the sub-peak shown for drift gillnets occurring in 1992 and '93 includes many metric tons of fish that were actually caught outside and above the Bight. I can say this because the drift gillnet fleet fished along side of us until late October for these two seasons and then moved to northern waters. 1993 was the last profitable year for many harpoon boats.

Where did they fish?

Most of this early catch came from the Bight of California. This was where these new gill-netters had grown up fishing as harpooners so this is where they fished with their driftnets. When, in just a few years, the Bight quit producing swordfish in the quantities they had become accustomed to the larger drift net vessels moved outside the Bight and North, working between the Cortez Bank and central California. By doing so they were able to continue fishing on the near shore stocks of fish that move north from Mexican waters each year. (See also the discussion of the California Bight as a fishery later in this document.)

Where do they fish now?

A group of smaller near-shore San Diego and Los Angeles based drift net boats still fish along the border and in the waters of the Bight. However, because they have had such limited success fishing within the Bight over the past ten years, most of the larger Southern California based drift net boats travel directly to the outer edges of the Bight or to the escarpment between Pt. Conception and Morro Bay when the season opens in August. These boats now follow the fish into northern California and sometimes Oregon state waters before their near shore season ends in January, or when they are forced to move south due to weather.

The development of the Mexican fleet.

In 1985 two of these California drift gillnet fishermen theorized that they could catch more fish in Mexican waters if they could only fish there. With swordfish available year round, they would only have to limit their fishing time during hurricane season. These Americans approached the Mexican government with a proposal to fish in Mexican waters. In return for their permits they would teach the Mexicans how to fish for swordfish using drift nets. The program was a rousing success. The Mexican fleet of swordfish boats grew dramatically and is still fishing today. Most of the fish caught by this fleet is imported to the United States after being landed in Mexico. Although only one American captain remains fishing in Mexico today, the fleet is now modernizing itself. The Mexican fleet, as of this writing, has converted all of its approximately 50 near shore driftnet boats to longline gear because it is more effective in terms of Catch Per Unit of Effort (CPUE). To my knowledge, Mexico still doesn't impose closures or limits of any kind on its swordfish fleet.

Longline fishing - The newest technology

In 1991, three Gulf of Mexico based longliners arrived in southern California and began test fishing for swordfish and tuna. This fishing was reportedly to be carried out outside of the 200-mile U.S. Exclusive Economic Zone, EEZ. Without observers aboard, it is impossible to tell exactly where the fishing was, or is being, done.

Longline landings

According to VOJKOVICH et al 1994, during 1991 and 1992 respectively, these three boats landed 27.5 and 28.8 metric tons of swordfish. In August of 1993, numerous longline vessels from the Gulf of Mexico began arriving in southern California. Landings for 1993 jumped to 101.3 metric tons. In 1994, with thirty-one boats in California, landings were reported to be 496.7 metric tons. Also stated in the Vojkovich paper is the fact that by sampling the catch, the average weight of the fish being caught was 139 lbs. The actual sample breakdowns were 13% under 55lbs. with the smallest of these weighing 13 lbs., 35% weighed between 55 and 110lbs., 35% weighed between 110 and 220lbs., with the remaining 17% weighing over 220 lbs. This is the same experience the Chilean longline fleet had just a few years before the fishery collapsed.

Updated longline landings information is plotted in Figure 4

The information contained in Figure 4 is the latest available NMFS data and indicates a much higher success rate during the test fishing and early fleet fishing years. The latest data available shows the 1991 landings to be 39.4 metric tons followed by 95.5, 165.5 and 739.7 for 1992, '93 and '94 respectively. I have plotted the available NMFS landing data for this fishery through 1998.

In addition to the Gulf of Mexico-based fleet fishing off of California, a large group of Hawaiian based longliners set up their operations in Los Angeles harbor in 1999. These boats are now fishing the eastern Pacific stocks that annually feed the California in-shore fishery. I believe the final boom of the classic boom-bust cycle that occurred in Chile is now or soon will be, in full swing in California and Mexico.

DRIFT GILLNETS AND LONGLINES - TOO EFFECTIVE AND TOO INEFFICIENT

EFFECTIVENESS

I created a five-year moving average (not shown) of landings for each of the three fisheries to produce a long-term trend analysis of the data. Again in the interest of smoothing out the three-year peak in the harpoon graph caused by 1978, the actual data point for 1978 (1171 mt) was replaced with the arbitrary figure of five hundred metric tons (500 mt).

Harpoon landings

The graph (not shown) clearly shows that until the deployment of drift gillnets, harpoon landings were slowly rising. With what is now known (after 1984) about the effectiveness of airplanes in the fishery, a fleet of fifty airplane/boat harpoon teams would have easily stabilized the harpoon landings well above 700 metric tons of swordfish per year with the previously healthy fish stocks.

Drift gillnet Landings

My graph (not shown) clearly shows a sharp decline in catch after just 10 years of targeted fishing with drift gillnets in the near shore waters of the California Bight. The actual peak of this fishery occurred in 1985, the year that Mexico first deployed drift gillnets. The chart shows a continuing, long-term trend toward further decline in the fishery. I feel this continuous decline in landings must be addressed by the Council as evidence of exceeding the Maximum Sustainable Yield in any plan development process.

Longline landings

It is apparent from the sharp rise of the graph that the longline fleet has targeted the pelagic population of swordfish that exists off our coast and which feeds the near shore and Bight fishery. The graph is almost as vertical as that of the early gillnet efforts. Based upon harpooners visual observations of these longliners unloading, it is logical to forecast the graph will rise much more steeply after the 1999 counts are tallied. It can also be forecasted with certainty that its eventual fall will come, and that its fall will be every bit as precipitous as was its rise. While these predictions are dire they are easy to substantiate. One need only review the landing data, which shows that 50% of the fish being landed are sub-adult pups, not swordfish!

EFFICIENCY

Drift gillnets and longlines are not efficient!

Targeting brother Commercial fishermen for additional grief based upon their levels of by-catch and discarded catch is not the intent in the discussion that follows. The intent is simply to reiterate concerns about the use of the term efficient to describe both drift gillnets and longlines as gear types. Coan et al, 1994 states that drift gillnets are efficient. Lindgram Pittman, the producers of a major amount of the pelagic longline gear in use today also brag about the efficiency of their gear. I absolutely disagree with the use of this term to describe these gears.

Both gear types are extremely effective at catching a wide array of sea life. Anything that swims in the ocean at the depths these gears are fished is liable to be caught by them. This statement alone belies the efficiency of the equipment. Efficiency in a gear type requires the ability to routinely target one species or specific size of that species while avoiding the catch of another. Neither of these gear types has been able to stand this test.

My purpose in this paper is to discuss the history and future of harpoon swordfishing. I pointedly leave the discussions about the obviously unacceptable levels of by-catch and discarded catch associated with these gears to others.

THE WRITING IS ON THE WALL

Chile - An object lesson for the California/Mexico near shore fishery.

The boom-bust scenario has been played out again and again in swordfishing all over the world as is well known. The current collapse in the Chilean fishery is one that parallels the Southern California/Mexico situation closely enough to deserve special note. At first it was a highly selective harpoon fishery that exported its' swordfish to the United States. As in California, harpooning swordfish in Chilean near shore waters has been documented as being practiced for hundreds, if not thousands of years.

FIGURE 6

NOTE ON DATA - FIGURE 6

There are hard data points for 1984,1991, 1995 and 1996. There are approximate data points for 1997 and 1998. The rise and fall of the data between 1984 and 1995 was shown as linear due to a lack of precise data. However, this rise and subsequent fall are both described as "steady" by NMFS Swordfish Links, Latin American Swordfish Page, Chilean summary, 1/18/2000. The rise in landings after 1995 reflects a change to fishing outside of the Chilean 200 mile EEZ and off other countries while still landing in Chile.

When man's inventiveness came into play and drift gillnets were put to sea in 1982, Chile became a major player in the world swordfish export market, again shipping much of its product to the U.S. This driftnet fishery was composed mainly of former harpooners and targeted the near shore coastal waters. The dramatic success of this fishery led to the introduction of pelagic longlines in the mid-1980's. As in California today, Chilean regulations limited the use of longlines to waters outside of 200 miles. From the start however, as in California today, the longliners reported catching large quantities of juvenile fish. The Chilean near shore fishery peaked in 1991 and has been in a precipitous decline since. By 1995, the international pelagic longliners were finished working Chilean off shore waters because they became economically non-viable. Since 1996, former near shore fishermen now fish pelagic longline gear off other countries.

California - A mirror image of Chile

1st A Harpoon fishery with long history

2nd A shift to Drift Gillnets for higher production

3rd Introduce Pelagic Longlines for yet higher production

Next…

THE WRITING IS ON THE WALL!

Fishery Collapses due to overfishing Then - Pelagic longliners move on, Locals go broke!

NOTE ON DATA FIGURE 7

California swordfish landings for all gear types were totaled to produce this chart comparing the Chilean situation to our own. If the California numbers are moved six years to the right to create a ten-year overlap presentation, the comparison is chilling. Only the numbers are different. Attempts to obtain Mexican landing figures for this time period to show the California/Mexico totals were unsuccessful.

Prior to the use of drift gillnets beginning in 1978, the Southern California near shore harpoon fishery for swordfish was viable, healthy and growing. Further, through the use of spotter planes, it was evolving into a technically correct model for the selective, sustainable harvest of swordfish. Drift gillnetting for swordfish in both California and Mexico has now severely diminished our near shore stock. With the introduction of a longline fishery off both California and Mexico (near shore in Mexico), I am convinced that we are witnessing the final few years, if not months, of this fishery's viability unless emergency international measures are taken. Ladies and gentlemen, the crisis is not approaching, it is upon us. A repeat of the Chilean debacle is on our doorstep! Conservation and management measures to prevent such an occurrence are needed immediately.

The Bight of California as a swordfishery

The waters of the Bight are unique. They are not, during our summer, part of the waters of the northeast Pacific, which are fed by the cold California Current. The Bight is annually washed by a swirling influx of warm water from the southeast that in turn displaces the California Current to the west. This annual push is caused by the northern reaches of the North Equatorial Countercurrent that flows northwest up the coast from the Gulf of Panama. In late summer and fall, we know by experience, this push can extend all the way to the Washington border (Jimmy Cornell, North Pacific Currents, WORLD CRUISING ROUTES, 1987).

The waters of the Bight and its outer banks were prime groundfish habitat in the 1960's and `70's. The fishing out of the groundfish from these banks by gear that was too effective has been well documented, is now regulated, and hopefully will be rebuilt. Once these stocks are rebuilt, this habitat will hopefully be managed as the long term, sustainable fishery it should be. The availability of on-board infrared sea surface temperature SST charts since the late 1980's has allowed us, the fishermen, to watch the ebb and flow of the counter current on an annual basis. By watching this picture change in late spring we can know exactly when to put our boats to sea in search of fish. This knowledge has also led us to the question of why we used to see swordfish all year and now we don't.

It is my theory that once there existed a somewhat stable, resident population of swordfish on our outer banks and those to the south of us. Despite the annual cool down of the water, swordfish were seen in these waters during every month of the year. Many of the older Harpooners can boast of having harpooned swordfish during every month of the year. While large numbers were not caught during the winter months due to weather conditions, a portion of the annual influx probably stayed because they found food in great abundance. Again, with the exception of a very few winter sightings, this has not been the case since the late 1970's. Clearly the explanation of this lies in the statistical facts presented in the portion of this paper dealing with landings over the past twenty-five years.

I also believe that this resident population of fish in the Bight was added to and mingled with, indeed replenished, by the annual push of warm water and migratory fish. Thus, when the fish moved inshore with the current change, local harpooners were actually fishing on a combination of resident and migratory fish. It is obvious from the graphs that this near shore or resident population, if it did exist, was greatly diminished by excessive fishing between 1980 and 1990. Since then, the harpooners have been fishing on the stocks that enter the Bight area from the pelagic migration.

The only alternative to the above theory is that the nearly year round fishing pressure by the Mexican near shore drift gillnet/longline fleet coupled with the annual pressure applied by the West Coast U.S. near shore drift gillnet fleet has resulted in a near collapse of the West Coast near shore swordfish stock. Placing additional pressures on the pelagic migration that obviously feeds this West Coast near shore fishery makes no sense at all.

44 Million Additional Hooks IS NOT The Answer!

The HMS Plan Development Team is currently considering the allowance of longline fishing within the EEZ in California. This is in addition to the pelagic longline vessels currently fishing off of California. The impact of this can only be realized by doing the math.

ASSUMPTIONS:

The 80 or so currently permitted California swordfish drift gillnet boats are allowed to convert to longline gear and fish within the EEZ.

They are allowed to fish between August and January (5 months).

Their gear is limited to 25-mile long sets with 1 hook every 300 feet.

They fish 25 days per month.

IMPACTS:

Up to 2,000 miles of gear set any night containing 35,200 baited hooks.

Each boat will set up to 55,000 baited hooks per season.

Total hooks per year = 4,400,000!

Total hooks over next ten years = 44,000,000!

The primary point to be made here is that some form of sea creature will eat every one of those

millions of hooks! Which creature is simple, the first one that finds the bait.

MORE EFFICIENT MANAGEMENT IS REQUIRED

The science is in; the writing is on the wall.

In Chile, a multi-million dollar export fishery for swordfish and sharks was brought to its knees within twelve years after the unmanaged introduction of drift gillnets and longlines. Chile is no longer a much of a factor in the world market. I quote NMFS Swordfish Links, Latin American Swordfish Page, Chilean Summary, 1/18/00: "Annual results from the fishery do show the classic indicators of overfishing." If that is true, what do our dramatically similar results show?

Let the near shore swordfish stocks recover!

It is high time that we humans stop catching every fish in the ocean just because we can. Nature has repeatedly reminded us that we are capable of overfishing any region. The scorched earth, strip-mining approach to fishing must be brought to an end and replaced with fisheries that are both selective and sustainable. Harpoon swordfishing is one of these and there are many others. It is apparent however, that if harpoon swordfishing is to ever be given a chance to show itself as the model of a traditional, sustainable and profitable fishery, the near shore stocks in Bight of California and Mexico must be allowed to recover. This recovery process can only be realized by enhancing the annual escapement of swordfish into the Bight of California. The only way to accomplish this is to apply efficient conservation and management measures to current and future West Coast near shore, and now, off shore swordfishing efforts. Declining landings in the harpoon fishery were the first indicator of trouble in the near shore California swordfishery. The turn-around of this decline will also be the leading indicator, the bellwether, showing that recovery has begun.

RECOMMENDATIONS

There are numerous measures available for managing fisheries. Time-area closures that limit damage to juvenile stocks may be one answer. Another may be imposing quotas on California based boats in addition to limiting imports by Mexican based operators in this unique shared fishery. Further, limited entry to swordfishing must be considered. Finally, the Council and the HMS Plan Development Team must now directly and objectively confront and deal with the unsavory problem of by-catch and discarded catch associated with drift gillnets and longlines.

In addition to offering the above methods for consideration, the writer takes the following specific positions:

1. I strongly oppose the introduction of longline gear inside the U.S. EEZ by anyone for any purpose, experimental or otherwise.

2. I support the immediate, emergency implementation of an observer program on all U.S. flagged longliners landing fish in California coupled with the mandatory installation of electronic tracking gear on these vessels. These two measures should be paid for by a landing fee or tax on all longline fish landed in or imported into the state.\

3. In place of a quota system for swordfish take, I support the implementation of a system triggering the immediate shut down of fishing by any gear type if low landing weight averages are detected in that fishery. This trigger should occur when the Department of Fish and Game catch measurements show that thirty percent of the average landing weight has fallen below 150 lbs dressed in any gear type. Discarded juvenile swordfish must be measured at sea and their numbers and weight must be included in this average.

4. I support the establishment of a realistic, total take quota system for sharks of all species, including discards, that when reached by any gear type triggers the automatic shutdown of that gear type for the remainder of that season.

5. I support the establishment of a realistic, total take quota system for discarded marlin and for sea turtles of all species that when reached by any gear type triggers an automatic shutdown of that gear type for the remainder of that season.

6. I encourage the implementation of import restrictions on Mexican longline swordfish and sharks until the U.S. near shore stocks show signs of recovery. These management methods penalize no one. Nor do they prevent anyone from fishing. They do however specifically target most areas of concern by specifically targeting the offender on a case-by-case basis. Whatever steps are taken to reverse the obvious current damage, a rising trend in future harpoon landings will be the first indicator that a reversal has occurred and the near shore swordfish population is on the mend. This trend reversal will only be seen by first preventing a Chilean style devastation of the off shore pelagic migration which feeds and rebuilds our near shore fishery and secondly, by enlisting the help of Mexico in rebuilding our shared near shore stocks.

CLEARLY, SCIENCE MUST PLAY A LARGER ROLE

While researching this paper, I have been constantly reminded that I am not a scientist and that not enough "Science" exists to support my conclusions. My conclusions are based upon the numbers of swordfish and sharks we no longer see and they are backed up by statistics supplied by government agencies! My suspicions are that no scientist in any of these agencies has ever simply graphed out these very compelling statistics. Had this simple thing been done, the question "what's wrong with this picture?" would surely have been asked. Maybe that would have lead to some "real science". I beg the council and every member of the HMS Plan Development Team to ask that question of the scientific community now and to have it specifically and "scientifically" answered prior to the implementation of a severely flawed HMS Management Plan.

It is quite frustrating to me that yet another swordfishery might be allowed to collapse before the scientific community decides that a study is in order. If we change anything in our fisheries management practices, it must be in the area of providing timely and thorough science to those charged with creating our fisheries management plans.

I thank the Council and the members of the HMS Plan Development Team for the opportunity to present one fisherman's position. I sincerely hope that my presentation provides you with additional perspective to assist in your critical work. I welcome and look forward to your comments.

Sincerely,

Larry E. Mebust