A severe decline in the commercial passenger fishing vessel rockfish (Sebastes spp.) catch in the Southern California Bight, 1980-1996

We analyzed data from the Marine Recreational Fishery Statistics Survey (MR FSS) to examine long-term bends in the Southern California Eight commercial passenger fishing vessel rockfish fishery. From 1980 to 1996 a total of 50 species were taken. There was a substantial decline in the overall catch p er unit of effort (CPUE) during that time. For individual species we observed four general temporal patterns: (1) a st eady decline throughout the period; (2) high CPUE from 1983 to 1986; (3) va riable catches throughout the 1980s but extremely low catches from 1993 to 1996; and (4) variable catches throughout the entire period. Among the seve ral species with particularly large declines were bocaccio (98.7%), blue ro ckfish (95.2%), and olive rockfish (83.0%). Three species that were abundan t in 1980 were absent by 1996 (chilipepper, swordspine, and yellowtail rock fishes). The number of species caught also decreased during the course of t he survey. We analyzed length frequencies for a subset of the species. On average, mea n total length declined. This decline was due mainly to the removal of the larger size classes rather than to increased catches of juveniles. An extre me example was observed for vermilion rockfish: over the course of the surv ey, the fishery changed from one comprising primarily adults to almost enti rely juveniles. We conclude that the declines in rockfish catches in the Southern Californi a Eight between 1980 and 1996 reflect reduced populations. These population declines probably result from poor long-term juvenile recruitment, caused by adverse oceanographic conditions, as well as from essentially unregulate d overfishing of adults and subadults, perhaps leading to recruitment overf ishing.