Farther west in the waters off the Kii Peninsula the yellowfin and bigeye tuna are 

 rather abundeint and albacore are taken in some numbers from September to November. From 

 December on the yellowfin and bigeye gradually begin to decline, while on the other hand the al- 

 bacore catch gradually increases. The albacore fishery is quite active from December to March. 

 The catch situation for the spearfishes is not greatly different from that in the Izu Shichito region 

 except that in this area broadbill are hardly taken at all. Black tuna are caught sporadically from 

 December to March. A little to the southward on the so-called Kinan Reef fishing grounds cen- 

 tered around 28° to 30° N. , 135 E. , the albacore fishing is very active in the period from Jan- 

 uary to March, and at the same time bigeye tuna are fairly abundant and spearfishes and yellow- 

 fin are also mixed in the catch to some extent. 



Farther to the west in the waters off Tosa (southern Shikoku) yellowfin are taken in 

 rather large numbers from October to December, while the bigeye catch shows more or less of 

 a tendency to increase in Jeinuary and February. In March and April the albacore catch is large, 

 the fishing grounds lying rather close along the shore. 



The so-called Satsunan area (south of Kyushu) has been a famous black tuna ground 

 since ancient times. As was stated earlier, in recent years there has been hardly any migration 

 of black tuna into this region and consequently there has been no catch. At present the only catch 

 is some bigeye tuna which are taiken in the winter. The good fishing grounds for black tuna in 

 general were from 30 - 32 N. latitude, 130°- 132 E. longitude. Formerly, when the black 

 tuna fishery was flourishing, the catch gradually increased from about the middle of December 

 and reached its peak from January to the latter part of February, in some years extending to the 

 first part of March. At this season the port of Aburatsu in Miyazaki Prefecture was bustling with 

 a large number of boats from other prefectures. After the first or middle part of March the 

 catch declined rather abruptly and ordinarily the fishing was completely ended by the latter part 

 of April or the early part of May. As will be related in a later section (V. Fishing Grounds, 

 1 1. Nankai Sea Area), the black tuna catch in this area declined abruptly after 1940 and from 

 1945 on there has been no catch at all. Different people give different explanations for this phe- 

 nomenon, but it should be noted well that it parallels perfectly the decline in the catch of sar- 

 dines. No quick decision can be made as to whether it is a falling off of the catch caused by a 

 cyclical decline in the black tuna stock accompanying changes in oceanographic conditions, or 

 whether the fishing grounds have deteriorated because the black tuna changed the course of their 

 food-seeking migration after the sardines ceased to congregate for spawning in this region. 

 Yellowfin are usually slightly more abundeint around October and the bigeye show approximately 

 the same pattern, but these species do not present such a clearly defined fishing season as did 

 the black tuna. The albacore catch in this region is extremely small. 



The waters to the west of this region from the west coast of Kyushu to Saishuto 

 (Quelpart Island) are famous as a fishing ground for the spearfishes. Around March to May some 

 of the black tuna which enter the Japan Sea with the Tsushinna Current are also taken there. The 

 spearfish season begins in July to September in the Saishuto (Quelpart Island) area and the 

 fishery gradually moves southward with the progress of the season. The positions of the fishing 

 grounds generally lie along the 100-fathom line of the continental shelf. Almost all of the tuna 

 taken in the Japaji Sea are black tuna. There are extremely rare reports of yellowfin being taken 

 there. The Tsushinna Current, which branches off from the main Kuroshio south of Kyushu, 

 passes through the Tsushima Strait and then flows north along the Japanese coast, while on the 

 continental side there is a southward flowing cold current. For this reason the fishing grounds 

 for the black tuna are naturally linnited to the Japan coast and they are only extremely rarely 

 taken along the Korean or Siberian coasts. During the sunnmer the schools gradually move 

 northward and in years when the warm current is very strong they sometimes pass along the 

 west coast of Hokkaido to be taken on the coasts of Sakhalin. In the Japan Sea area there is no 

 longline fishery at all, the tuna being taken entirely with fixed gear. 



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