In Reply to: And now for somethign different posted by seahunt on August 19, 2007 at 10:57:16:

Lots of fun, Seahunt – very enjoyable. And although I don’t quite go back as far as 1850, the 1950’s and 60’s were fairly damned robust too. I did things back then, though not looked askance at or deemed bad at the time, I am deeply embarrassed about now.

Re your suggestion regarding harvesting the MPAs, I would advise being very careful here, particularly from Pt Conception south. The population of (red) abs that are growing back at Conception, San Miguel, Santa Rosa, et. al, are the survivors of the Withering Foot syndrome, a couple of harsh El Nino years, and the infection from that accidentally introduced South African parasitic worm. These were the strongest of the strong – those members of the Haliotis clan that took everything Man and nature could throw at them and still kept the species going. To advocate harvesting now, at this early recovery period would, I feel, be fatal to the species. Though over crowding of abs in this end of the state may happen again someday, now certainly isn’t the time to talk or even think about it. Let the survivors reproduce and rebuild a strong healthy population.

My .02 cents.

• I agree seahunt 17:28:04 08/19/07 (0)