ODFW News: Cabezon Closure

[Pete]

For immediate release Tuesday, August 17, 2004

Recreational cabezon fishery to close

NEWPORT - The sport fishery for cabezon will be closed as of tomorrow, Wednesday, August 18. Sport fishers may continue to harvest most other groundfish species, but may not retain cabezon in the saltwater sport fishery.

"Landing data for the saltwater sport fishery indicate that we will have met our limit for the sport harvest of cabezon," said Don Bodenmiller, project leader for marine recreational groundfish fisheries for the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife.

By the end of July 2004, more than 15 metric tons of cabezon were taken in the sport fishery. This compares to 10.5 metric tons of cabezon taken by the end of July 2003. "The projected catch through August 17 will be at our catch limit of 15.8 metric tons for cabezon," said Bodenmiller.

Better-than-usual weather in March and April got the groundfish fishery off to a quick start. Another factor that may have contributed to the early closure, noted Bodenmiller, was that, as of June 1, the sport groundfish fishery was closed outside of 40 fathoms for the first time.
This may have resulted in an increase in nearshore fishing where cabezon reside.

Any cabezon caught after August 17 must be released. "Cabezon have an excellent survival rate when released, even when caught in deep water," said Bodenmiller, "because they do not have an air bladder." By contrast, species with air bladders, such as rockfish, often die when removed from deep water. Cabezon harvest in Oregon has been limited by the Oregon Fish and Wildlife Commission in recent years because the health of the stock is uncertain and annual catches were increasing.

[Threemuch]

This is bull. I haven't seen ANY cabezon at the fish cleaning stations. Very few people have been targeting bottomfish since halibut opened.

Sometimes I really question their catch data. Oh, well, Cabbies are too hard to clean anyway.

[Nalu]

The charter boats out of Depoe Bay have been hammering the cabbies this year. Not sure about the other ports. One of the deckhands I know on a bottomfishing only boat claims that they have caught way more this year than in previous years.

Seems reasonable to close the fishery to me.

As far as questioning the count data.... The fish checkers in Depoe and Newport sure work hard to get everything they can recorded. Is there a suggestion out there on how to get better data than the current hard working folks running from dock to dock gather now?

[Threemuch]

I don't know of a better method to record fish caught other than requiring trip reports from all fishermen, but if they survey the party boats hard, who target bottomfish a great deal and multiply those numbers by the number of anglers out there in small boats I can see how they think 15mt have been caught.

I think they are trying to err on the side of caution, and I like that, but 15MT is a bunch of cabbies. Actually, after just doing the math, that is only 6000 5 pound fish, or 3000 10 pounders, which I guess isn't that many.