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Over the last several weeks there's been a lot of strong wind and the water temperature has dropped significantly. As the water temp dropped, the bay started filling up with schools of some kind of baitfish. It's been fun watching hundreds of birds diving on them, as well as two types of dolphin, along with sea lions working the schools of fish. The sky was full of Frigates, Terns, Pelicans, and two types of Comorants. We even had the luck to paddle board right into the middle of a bunch of the smaller dolphin feeding. It was pretty cool having them dart right by us while chasing fish only a few feet from our boards.

Yesterday evening this guy arrived:



For an hour or so they criss crossed the area in front of us, I'm assuming with some sort of sonar to detect the schools of fish, then spent most of the night netting various areas of the bay:





I would imagine by the end of the night shift this guy is pretty loopy from inhaling those diesel fumes:




This morning the ocean is strangely devoid of any birds, dolphin, or sea lions. They appear to have moved on. Seems surreal after the area having been so alive for the last several weeks.

I hear you man. While we understand the need for the local economy to work, there is a part of us that just wishes we could preserve everything the way it is. We go through our own cycles here as well but the amazing thing is that the ocean has an incredible ability to recover. The local area was cleaned out of what was once a large abalone community. I am part of a group that is in the process of "replanting" abalone out in the bay that fronts San Martin island. It was quite a process but we now have obtained the Federal Concession for the west side of the island and the permits are now all approved to begin the seeding.

Initial test plants we performed so far are doing quite well and it looks like in five years we will have a large and thriving abalone community once again.

Keep your fingers crossed...

Wooo, That's sad!! I'm glad that I'm on the inner bay so I don't have to watch that kind of large scale plundering!! I do understand that people have families to feed, but I'd like to see nets banned world-wide! How many dolphin do you think may have been caught up in those nets?

BG, very interesting! Will that be a secret or protected growing area? Will you be able to control the harvesting or will anyone be able to go in & strip it??

It will be a protected area. We have built housing on the island and currently have a work force of about 15 performing construction and security duty as well. Our permits and concession authorize us to control access to the area. I don't suspect there will be much of a problem for now as the abalone requires a few more years to grow in size.

The up front costs are high as we are scheduled to seed several hundred thousand per year for five years. Obviously we will need to protect the investment. We obtained written authorization to use armed security on-site as needed and and we just received word last week that will include backup from the local navy patrol boats as well.

We have spent the last year removing trash from the island and it really has made an impact. Still more work to do but a lot of progress has been made and we are getting help now from a few local environmental groups wanting to help with the project.

It is keeping us very busy and I am excited about the project.

Great job!!! I sincerely applaud your efforts!! And I've never tasted abalone in my life!

Sorry Wooo - we hijacked your thread...

Not really, great project and info. I hope it goes well!

I saw the boat leaving early this morning. There was hardly any freeboard on the sides. Waterline was only about a foot or two below the side rails. It's hard to judge them, but it's so sad to see a deserted ocean after the area was so alive. Amazing how fast things changed.

I tried to see if they were getting any dolphin, but couldn't tell. Fortunately we didn't see any in the area when they were fishing...at least while it was still light out.

Do you know what they caught Wooo???

Originally Posted by BajaGringo

Do you know what they caught Wooo???

That was going to be my next question. We paddled through some pretty big schools of them, seemed about mackerel size, but I really have no idea what they were.

Originally Posted by BajaGringo

Do you know what they caught Wooo???

I found out a couple days ago from a local fisherman that the boat was fishing illegally. Apparently this type of netting (seiner?) isn't supposed to be within 15 miles or so of the coast.

They were catching mackerel (and they caught ALL of them) to feed the tuna pens off Ensenada.