Giant Black Sea Bass
It’s that time of year again! The now annual Great Giant Sea Bass Count (2015 edition) is almost here and divers are gearing up to spot some more giants.
For those who didn’t hear about the Great Giant Sea Bass Count last year, the project involves using observations and sightings from recreational divers to help us better understand how many giant sea bass (still affectionately referred to by many as Black Sea Bass or Giant Black Sea Bass) call the waters of Southern California “home”. Since the moratorium on fishing giant sea bass was implemented, unofficial observations suggest that these gentle giants appear to be rebounding from their near local extinction in the early 20th century, thus inspiring researchers to try and determine a minimum baseline abundance of local giant sea bass.
With Dr. Milton Love, Dr. Mary Nishimoto, and Dr. Douglas McCauley on the research team at the University of California Santa Barbara, improvements have been made to the framework of last year’s Great Giant Sea Bass Count and the methods for reporting one’s dives to The Count. All observations can now be easily reported at http://www.seasketch.org. Sea Sketch provides an interactive and user friendly platform that gives a diver the opportunity to place their dive site on a map of Southern California and report the giant see bass they saw (or didn’t see).
The Sea Sketch platform
This year the Great Giant Sea Bass Count will occur from August 1st through the 16th. During this time, recreational divers are asked to jump in the water and keep their eyes peeled for giant sea bass! Whether they are coastal, island, shipwreck, SCUBA, freedive, rocky reef, mud flats, boat or beach dives, the more divers in the water the better! One of the strengths of this kind of project is that, with the invaluable help of recreational divers throughout the state, a large scope of habitat types and dive locations may be surveyed in a short period of time. This helps researchers take a “snap-shot” of Southern California’s local giant sea bass population. Zeros are important numbers for science as well, and we want to hear from as many divers as possible, even if they don’t encounter any black sea bass. This is a really fun opportunity to be involved in a “citizen science” project that will help us all understand a little more about this awesome species of fish.
In addition to the Great Giant Sea Bass Count in August, a year-round count has been added to the Sea Sketch website for both divers and fishermen to let us know when and where they spot giant sea bass outside of the official “Great Giant Sea Bass Count” dates. This will help researchers better understand the relatively unknown seasonal migratory patterns for these fish.
The official “Great Giant Sea Bass Count 2015” flier provides plenty of information about participating in The Great Giant Sea Bass Count and navigating the Sea Sketch website to report dives. While the Sea Sketch website is the easiest way to share your dive, if it is just not quite your style then please don’t hesitate to email your dive details, along with any questions or concerns about The Count, to gianseabasscount@gmail.com.
For more information on The Count and all things giant sea bass, please visit the Giant Sea Bass Collective’s Facebook page https://www.facebook.com/giantseabass and the Facebook event for the Great Giant Sea Bass Count https://www.facebook.com/events/1616265525277992.
Happy Diving!