ABSTRACT 



This report provides ichthyoplankton and associated station 

 and tow data from California Cooperative Oceanic Fisheries 

 Investigations (CalCOFI) cruises conducted off California and Baja 

 California in 1984. It is the twenty-fourth report in a series 

 that presents these data for all biological-oceanographic CalCOFI 

 surveys from 1951 to the present. A total of 918 stations was 

 occupied during 8 monthly multivessel cruises over the survey area, 

 which extended from Pt. Reyes, California to Rosario Bay, Mexico, 

 and seaward to several hundred miles. The data are listed in a 

 series of 6 tables; the background, methodology, and information 

 necessary for interpretation and quantitative analysis of the data 

 are presented in an accompanying text. All pertinent station and 

 tow data, including volumes of water strained and standard haul 

 factors, are listed in the first table. Another key table lists, 

 by station and month, standardized counts of each of the 13 5 lairvai 

 fish categories identified from survey samples. This and previous 

 and subsequent reports make the CalCOFI ichthyoplankton and station 

 data available to all investigators and serve as guides to the 

 computer data base. 



INTRODUCTION 



This report, the twenty-fourth of a series, provides 

 ichthyoplankton and associated station and tow data from California 

 Cooperative Oceanic Fisheries Investigations (CalCOFI) joint 

 biological-oceanographic survey cruises conducted in 1984. This 

 program was initiated in 1949, under the sponsorship of the Marine 

 Research Committee of the State of California, to study the 

 population fluctuations of the Pacific sardine {Sardinops sagax) 

 and the environmental factors that may play a role in such 

 fluctuations. CalCOFI, known as the California Cooperative Sardine 

 Research Program from 1949 to 1953, was made up of representatives 

 of the South Pacific Fisheries Investigations (SPFI) of the U.S. 

 Fish and Wildlife Service [now the La Jolla Laboratory, National 

 Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) ] , the Scripps Institution of 

 Oceanography (SIO) , the California Department of Fish and Game 

 (CDFG) , the California Academy of Sciences (CAS) and the Hopkins 

 Marine Station of Stanford University. The first three of these 

 agencies supplied ships and personnel to conduct the sea surveys. 

 NMFS processed the plankton samples and analyzed the 

 ichthyoplankton from them. SIO processed and analyzed the 

 hydrographic samples and measurements and also analyzed 

 invertebrate groups from the plankton samples. 



The boundaries, station placement, and sampling frequency for 

 the CalCOFI survey area were based on the results of joint 

 biological and oceanographic cruises conducted by NMFS and SIO 

 during 1939-41. Those cruises were designed to collect sardine 



