Fishing by the live -bait method has been attempted in 

 the Hawaiian Islands, Phoenix, and Line Islands area by our ves- 

 sels HUGH M. SMITH, HENRY O'MALLEY, and by the private 

 vessels PIONEER, OREGON, and CALISTAR. These trials covered 

 practically all months of the year and yellowfin and skipjack tuna 

 were taken by all of them, mostly on the leeward sides of the 

 islands within 3 miles of the reefs around the shore. The catch 

 per hour's scouting was superior to that obtained by the commer- 

 cial fishery around the Hawaiian Islands . The catch was predomi- 

 nantly yellowfin tuna in the Line and Phoenix islands while around 

 the Hawaiian Islands the catch was predonninantly skipjack. 



The major limitation on the live -bait fishing method for 

 expanding the harvest of tuna in the central Pacific either by the 

 large tuna clippers or by the small sampans is the scarcity of 

 suitable live -bait throughout the area. The best baiting grounds 

 are in the nnain Hawaiian Islands, where a commercial fleet of 

 sampans is now utilizing the bait stocks to the maximum. The 

 Phoenix and Line islands show the most promise with regard to 

 the number of surface schools of tuna found, but have little bait 

 with which to capture tuna using the live -bait method. 



Although the scarcity of live bait is the major diffi- 

 culty, the large tuna clippers have additional troubles in the central 

 Pacific. The tuna schools themselves are small, fast, and quite 

 difficult to chum. The large clipper is less successful with these 

 schools than the much smaller sampan type of vessel used in the 

 live-bait fishery around the Hawaiian Islands, which has the speed 

 and maneuverability to cope with these "wild" schools. However, 

 the sampan is handicapped by its small carrying capacity and 

 limited cruising range. 



Longlining stands out as a method with great promise 

 for large-scale tuna production in the central Pacific. The area 

 of good catching rate with this gear is enormous (see fig. 20). 

 With this gear there is no need to scout for surface schools or 

 other fish "signs". The gear is set "blind" and does not fail to 

 catch tuna when in the proper zone, although the catching rate 

 varies. Weather never prevents operation and bait is no problem. 

 Frozen herring, sardine, squid, and mackerel are all suitable for 

 bait and available from Mainland sources . Although the tuna caught 

 by this method are near the upper size range for canning accepta- 

 bility and some are beyond it, the percentage of over-sized can be 

 reduced to almost negligible proportions by selection of fishing 

 grounds (see fig. 19|; and eventually it should be possible to find 



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