FIGURE 45.-Catch of hake aboard U.S. trawler. Samples 

 for biological studies were taken from catches. 



ABUNDANCE AND DISTRIBUTION 

 OF PACIFIC HAKE 



In summer, Pacific hake are found in comparatively 

 shallow waters over the Continental Shelf from British Co- 

 lumbia southward to northern California. In winter, they 

 move to spawning grounds off southern California. 



In the spring of 1967, a survey was made to determine 

 if hake spawn off the Pacific Northwest. The area sur- 

 veyed for fish eggs and larvae covered Puget Sound and 

 the coast from central British Columbia southward to the 

 Oregon-California border. The research vessels John N. 

 Cobb and George B. Kelez took samples up to 300 miles off- 

 shore. The Miller Freeman was sent on a 6-week cruise 

 in February 1968 to the hake spawning grounds off southern 

 California. The findings from the cruises supijort the hy- 

 pothesis that no coastal hake spawn north of southern Cal- 

 ifornia waters. 



Our understanding of the distribution and abundance of 

 hake and other groundfish in relation to biological and physi- 

 cal factors in the environment is limited. Some measure- 

 ments of primary productivity have been made by our ocean- 

 ographers, and plankton samples have been taken on the 

 coastal cruises. More sampling and analysis must be done 

 before the gap in knowledge is closed. 



At least one separate population of hake remains in Puget 

 Sound throughout the year. This population was not fished 

 commercially until November 1965, which gave our biologists 

 an opportunity to gather data from the beginning of a fish- 

 ery. Like the coastal hake, Puget Sound hake make spawn- 

 ing migrations but apparently over a limited distance. Our 

 biologists found hake feeding and maturing in Saratoga 

 Passage and other parts of Puget Sound during the summer 

 and autumn. In winter and early spring the hake moved 

 to Port Susan where spawning was at a peak in April. 



— 34 



