San Luis Obispo, CA: March 7, 2007 - A 25-year study published in the December 2006 edition of California Cooperative Oceanic Fisheries Investigations (CalCOFI) concludes that nearshore rockfish along the Central Coast of California are not in decline. Fishermen along the Central Coast are elated with the results according to Darby Neil of Virg's Sportfishing. "It's good to finally have the scientists agreeing with what fishermen have been saying for years." Steve Moore, owner of Patriot Sportfishing said, "This is fantastic news for fishermen. The government has been cutting our fishing opportunity without any scientific data. Now we have the data and it proves what we have always known, the fish are abundant along our coast."

Nine marine scientists collaborated in this rockfish report, including professors from California Polytechnic State University, staff of the California Department of Fish & Game and a marine biologist with Tenera Environmental, Inc. Lead author Dr. John Stephens says, "This is the first publication of nearshore rockfish research on the Central Coast and covers 25 plus years. We were surprised that there was not much change from the data collected in the 80's and 90's."

Dr. Stephens and other staff at California Polytechnic State University collated data gathered from 1976-2004 by Tenera Environmental, Inc. along with data gathered by the California Department of Fish & Game from 1988-1998. Observers from the graduate department of Cal Poly acted as observers on passenger fishing vessels gathering data over three years (2003-2005) using the same survey model used by Fish & Game in their earlier study.

Harold Davis, owner of Davis Boats in Paso Robles says, "Fishing-related businesses have been harmed by claims of anti-fishing advocates saying that ocean fish stocks are in decline. Now we have scientific data that shows they are wrong."

The study was initiated by the Marine Interest Group of San Luis Obispo and funded by grants from the Central Coast Fisheries Conservation Coalition, the Steelhead Recovery Coalition, Port San Luis Harbor Commission, Port San Luis Commercial Fisheries Organization, and the Resources Legacy Fund Foundation.

[For further information, contact Melvin A. de la Motte, Jr. (805)544-2424. Full text of the study can be found at: http://www.calcofi.org/newhome/publications/CalCOFI_Reports/v47/vol47_toc.htm]