L.O.H.S. is not a disease, but you might as well treat yelloweye as if they will make you sick.

L.O.H.S. is Loss OF Halibut Season.

Please avoid contact with these tasty fish at all cost. Our federally imposed limit for the entire Washington State coast is 3 metric tons. In real numbers that?s only a few hundred fish to last all year. We will struggle to stay within 3 metric tons in bycatch during our halibut season alone. If your fishing halibut and start catching yelloweye, please move to a different location. You don't have to move far, but try to stay away from them.

Ouch!!! A real bummer, especially considering the draw of yelloweye. I've never targeted them here in WA. but do when we go play fishing in AK and they're a super-eating fish.

Any reasons behind the poor stock status??? Anything to do with how long it takes for them to get of any size??

Well it has a lot to do with commercial trawl catches in the 80's of 30 to 40 metric tons each year and then a whopping 98 metric tons in 1989. Unfortunatly thats old news and we are left to deal with the restrictions. Then the other part of it has to do with the same ocean conditions that plague salmon. Cold is good, hot is bad, for reproduction.

Not to say that we never harvested any, usually around 10 to 12 metric tons yearly, until last year when we hit 15 metric tons. But in that lies the problem. Trying to reduce 15 mt down to 3mt when over 3/4 of the yelloweye catch is linked to the halibut season is a tall order.

Another problem is that this is not going away anytime soon. We probably won't be targeting much yelloweye in Washington for most of our lifetimes. NMFS makes a designation of overfished now and we get a rebuilding plan. This could cut us back further next year.

But we are still better off with a good rebuilding plan then the alternative, a plan with minimal conservation. What happened a few years ago with fluke is a plan that had little chance of success and the enviros sued. The result was a federal judge implimenting severe restrictions. They estimate losses of about $100 million yearly because of it.

Unfortunately it's hard to play catch and release with a fish that throws up its stomach because of the pressure change. Any "safe way" to release the fish to ensure they survive?

Dogfish,

No, and that will be one of the hardest parts. We will have to throw back dead fish. But allowing retention is worse than throwing back dead because then people will think its ok to keep fishing for them untill they catch their limit.

Mike, I was wondering the same thing before you posted. What about the long-liners and draggers out there that scoop it all up.
When I used to have a hand-jiggers license, it was a good thing to catch those big guys,it meant a bigger profit for the boat. I now see that I was a part of the problem......sorry!
But you make a good point, we have to use our heads to help the fish as well in order to keep our fishing priviledges intact.
I think that the Fisheries guys are smarter than that though, they will know somethings up when they pass overhead and see all those orange floaters everywhere.....they will count all the released and dead fish against the sporties whether we bring them in or not, so you may want to rethink the part about wasting them. I do agree with your idea of not targeting them though, maybe mark the fishing spot on our GPS with a skull and cross instead of a fish mark.

FISHNG1
Sorry, should have been more clear. If you check out the federal regulations established by the Pacific Fisheries Management Council, you will see that in 2002 no retention of yelloweye is allowed when halibut are on board the boat. This requires us to release dead fish. I don't like releasing dead fish, but it is nessessary to prevent people from filling out their yelloweye limit after they have caught their halibut. They will be counting discarded fish toward our catch.

In my experience, if your targeting halibut and your catching lings or yelloweye, your in the wrong area, they do not inhabit the same area as a general rule. Lings and snaps like structure, pinnacles, reefs, ledges and drop-offs, halibut prefer flats.
I've got a list of over 400 waypoints around Prince of Wales Is., about 1/2 are salmon spots the others are either marked as halibut or lings/snaps none are labeled as butts/lings and snaps. One thing to keep in mind, if a rockfish or small ling spends much time in halibut territory, they will end up as halibut lunch.
I have successfully released yelloweye, the key being, once you realize its a rockfish, bring it up SLOW and stop about every 25 ft, give them a chance to adjust to the pressure change, if there air bladder isn't blown up, they will swim away, if it is, poke a small hole in it, alot of times these fish will also swim away. If you do reel them up at warp speed, forget it, throw'em in the box.

they'll have to put a fathom law about how deep you can fish like the one thats proposed in california or already is in effect. I thinks its about 100ft. not sure thou, but you fish over the deep slopes of pinnacles or other deepwater haunts you basiclly kill any thing with a bladder. when there eyes puff up there history.

Here in Washington 77% of our yelloweye catch is taken during our halibut seasons. Figuring out if the majority of yelloweye taken are incidental while fishing for halibut or targeted after halibut are kept depends on who you talk to and where they are fishing. We do have good halibut spots with very few yelloweye to worry about. But we also have areas that are known as good halibut spots where it is not uncommon to bring up a limit of yelloweye before you get any halibut.

There is a depth restriction regulation that will be put in place if we are projected to exceed the 3 metric ton limit. All fishing, except salmon, will close in waters deeper than 25 fathoms (150 ft). The closure will be based on a series of lines that approximated 150 feet rather than actuall bottom contour. The closure is not to ensure survival of released fish, but to eliminate catching yelloweye at all.