CALIFORNIA FISH AND GAME 299 



available to the fishermen. Since there is no way in which the actual 

 abundance of winter fish could have increased, it is probable that an 

 unusually large part of the coast's sardine population gathered in the 

 San Pedro area during the 1933-1934 winter season. 



PREDICTIONS FOR THE 1934-1935 SARDINE SEASON 



Fall Fishery: San Francisco and Monterey {August-November) . 



The moderately abundant year-class which entered the San Pedro 

 fishery in the fall of 1933 will be the main support of the Monterey 

 fishery in the fall of 1934 and, as a consequence, fish will be quite 

 abundant. These fish will average 9^ to 10 inches in total length. The 

 San Francisco fall fishery will also be influenced by this same year- 

 class but more large fish will occur in the fishery than at Monterey. 

 The boats in both the Monterey and San Francisco fall fisheries should 

 not have great difficulty in making catches and sardines will be con- 

 sidered fairly abundant. 



Fall Fishery: San Pedro {Novemher -December). 



Studies of young fish indicate that the year-class entering the fish- 

 ery in the fall of 1934 will be below normal in abundance. Conse- 

 quently in the San Pedro fall fishery the year-class which entered in 

 the fall of 1933 will be the main support of the fishery. As at Mon- 

 terey these fish will be satisfactorily abundant and average 9^ to 10 

 inches in total length. 



Winter Fishery: All Localities. 



During the winter in all localities sardines will be no more abundant 

 and perhaps less so than in the winter of the 1933-1934 season. The 

 group which entered the San Pedro fall fishery in 1933 will play a 

 small role in the winter fishery and help somewhat to increase the 

 abundance. A small proportion, perhaps one-fourth, of the winter fish 

 will be approximately 10 inches in length but the majority will be 11 

 inches or greater. 



POSSIBILITY OF OVERFISHING 



The California sardine population has been subjected to very heavy 

 fishing for the last decade and has withstood the strain remarkably 

 well. "Whether it can continue to do so is a question of considerable 

 doubt. Many people have compared the California fishery with the 

 far larger sardine fishery of Japan and the huge herring fishery of the 

 North Sea. Each of these is nearly four times the size of our California 

 sardine fishery and the natural assumption is that there can be no 

 danger of depletion here if we are taking less than one-third as much 

 as these other fisheries. The answer is that the fishing areas off the 

 California coast are comparatively meager and comprise only a small 

 fraction of those of Japan or the North Sea, and that in terms of tons 



