Just as their name suggests, these guys prefer to live around rocks. 28 species of rockfish live in the Salish Sea, from 3-inch tide pool dwellers to 3-foot lunkers that live in deeper water and weigh in at 25 pounds. Most are slow-growing and long-lived, some live to be more than a century old. They have a completely different lifestyle from live-fast and die-young salmon. Foraging for other fish, they may swim only a few hundred miles in their lifetime. Rockfish tend to hang out together in groups around rock pinnacles or cliffs, places with lots of tidal current (which helps bring meals to them and not the other way around). Canary rockfish usually have three stripes angling down and backwards on the head, the middle one often runs across the eye. This is a very bright and distinctive fish.

The conservation of this fish is a real success story, and one that shows how science and government work together to make our lives, and the fish’s lives better. After discovering how good rockfish tastes, a definite over-exploitation of these tasty fish began in the 1800’s until canary rockfish were declared overfished in 2000 when it was discovered that rockfish had declined 70% since the 1960’s. Fish and Wildlife submitted a petition to have 14 rockfish species listed under the Endangered Species Act (eventually, all these were not listed). Enter science-based studies of them, plus just plain asking fishermen “where are you catching canary rockfish so we can have you fish elsewhere”. Fishing rules were changed, different gear was introduced and suddenly, in half the time it was thought it hopefully might happen, we have plenty of rockfish.

Larry Eifert paints and sails the Pacific Northwest from Port Townsend. His large-scale murals can be seen in many national parks across America, and at larryeifert.com.