oceanographic conditions were similar. In both 

 years the water in the Hawaiian Islands area 

 warmed early (Seckel and Waldron, 1960) ; 

 the total catch was above average ; and Y/g 

 was also large (table 9) even though the av- 

 erage number of men hooking per effective trip 

 (both classes of vessels) was 9.6 in 1954 and 

 7.3 in 1959. 



Richard S. Shomura (personal communica- 

 tion) has suggested that failure of this decline 

 in Y/g to appear may have been the result of 

 a change in the fishing techniques necessitated 

 by a decrease in the number of skilled fisher- 

 men. In the past, when a fisherman caught a 

 fish, he grasped it under his arm so that he 

 could remove the barbless hook ; he then 

 dropped the fish on the deck. (Among local 

 fishermen, the method is called "catch" or its 

 Japanese equivalent "daku" which means to 

 hold in one's arm.) A considerable amount of 

 practice and experience is required before one 

 develops the skill necessary to fish by this 

 method. Another method used only occasionally 

 in the past was "flipping," in which the fisher- 

 man swings the fish aboard and suddenly re- 

 laxes the tension of the pole to permit the 

 hook to fall clear of the fish's mouth before it 

 drops on the deck. (This method is sometimes 

 called "mochikomu" which in Japanese means 

 to bring in.) Interviews with fishermen indi- 

 cated that flipping allows them to catch fish 

 faster and does not require the same degree of 

 skill as "catching fish under the arm," but the 

 fishermen tire more rapidly. The shift in 

 emphasis from catching under the arm to 

 flipping permitted a short-handed crew of 

 limited experience to equal or better the catch 

 of a larger and more experienced group of 

 fishermen. Because flipping bruises the fish, 

 some fishermen still catch under the arm when 

 fishing large skipjack, which bring a premium 

 price on the fresh-fish market. Damaged fish 

 bring lower prices. 



Changes in the Efficiency of Class 1 Vessels 



Fishing efl^ciency per vessel also increases 

 when vessels that do poorly in the fishery are 

 forced to stop fishing. In 1952-62, the number 

 of Class 1 vessels actively fishing decreased 

 from 16 to 8 (2 were wrecked and 6 stopped 



fishing). When Class 1 vessels were ranked 

 according to the total catch of each vessel, the 

 results showed that the eight vessels fishing 

 in 1962 were usually among those that were 

 ranked high in previous years. Because those 

 that did pooi-ly stopped fishing, the fishing 

 efficiency (as measured by the average catch 

 per efl'ective trip) of all the remaining vessels 

 increased. This increase in fishing efficiency 

 also may have off'.set the effect of the decline in 

 the number of men hooking per trip. 



The number of Class 2 vessels reached a 

 maximum of 14 in 1955 and declined to 12 in 

 1962 (1 was wrecked and 1 stopped fishing). 

 Since only one vessel in this size class has 

 stopped fishing, the efficiency of the class could 

 not be expected to change markedly. 



Amount of Bait Used per Effective Trip 



Bait supply as well as the number of men 

 hooking per effective trip may affect catch. 

 It is important, then, to determine whether the 

 larger vessels do carry and use more bait than 

 the smaller ones. Data on bait catch (table 10) 

 permitted investigation of this problem. 



Table 10. — Total buckets of bait used and amount used per 

 effective trip by Class 1 and Class 2 Hawaiian skipjack 

 tuna vessels, 1952-62 



Class 1 



Class 1 



Total 



1952 



1953 



1954 



1956 



1956 



1967 



1968 



1969 



1960 



1961 



1962 



Average 



1 otai 

 buckets Effective 



of bait 

 used 



Number 



12,202 



12,932 



12,592 



13,144 



12,092 



8,187 



5,721 



10,233 



5.748 



9.462 



9,315 



10.148 



trips 



Buckets I Total 

 used per 



effec- 

 tive trip 



loiai 

 buckets Effective 



of bait 

 used 



trips 



Buckets 

 used per 



effec- 

 tive trip 



Nitmber Number Number Number Number 



855 14.3 11.319 692 16.4 



1.107 ' 11.7 14.163 I 970 14.6 



987 12.8 15.503 | 899 17.2 



933 ] 14.1 16.092 I 872 18.4 



931 I 13.0 14.688 1 956 ' 15.2 



668 12.2 13.497 910 I 14.8 



659 8.7 10.966 , 865 i 12.7 



779 13.1 17.961 1,055 I 17.0 



614 9.4 10.593 931 I 11.4 



696 13.6 18.051 1.118 16.1 



726 12.8 14.733 935 15.8 



814 12.3 14.315 928 15.4 



Class 2 vessels used more bait per effective 

 trip in all years for which there were records. 

 The 11-year unweighted averages indicated 

 that Class 1 vessels used 12.3 buckets per 

 effective trip compared with 15.4 buckets per 

 effective trip by Class 2 vessels. The difference 

 in the average number of buckets of bait 

 used per effective trip between class 1 and 

 Class 2 vessels was statistically significant 



U.S. FISH AND WILDLIFE SERVICE 



191 



