MBK 7/14

On the subject of fish identification; I picked up a cool laminated tri-fold DFG pacific rockfish identification cart in color at Bayside Marine in Santa Cruz harbor for $6.95. It fits easily into a small drybag or tackle box and is roughly 3.5x11" and flexible-I carry mine with me now all the time-just paranoid about confusing a Canary for Vermillion-Scallen is probably LOL at me right now. They also offer them from another company on the DFG site for ocean fish identification and I have also seen posters which would be nice for the office so I can day dream even more while I'm sitting here at work. Mike

i like olive rf but i could swear those are the calicos , were you by mcabee beach by chance?

i have speared enough of them to know what an olive is and what a calico is and mcabee is real close to where i get em. the largest i have gotten there is around 20". the orangy color around the lower mouth looks just like a calico.

they sure look like calicos!

john

John,

I think you you thingking of a YellowEye and maybe Vermillon. A Canary is yellow with a white stripe on the lateral line.

Ken kickfish

Calicos have more pronounced spots (at least that's how I look at it) - here's a shot of Bill and a San Clemente Island Calico......

mooch, I think those spots fade after it is dead. do you have a hand pic of an olive?

love to see them side by side, fresh caught and dead.

J

mooch, I think those spots fade after it is dead. do you have a hand pic of an olive?

love to see them side by side, fresh caught and dead.

J

I'll find one and post it on the fish ID section....

check out the one scallen got on the middle bottom and compare it to my calico i shot last year in this pic, they look really similar, pattern and all. that calico was appx 18".

john

here's a lighter color version of a calico I caught and released in SCI....

here is another little comparison of both fish , the top being an olive and the bottom being a calico. look at the top fin on the fish, the olive rf has a smooth rounded fin while the calico has a top fin which starts with a really tall ray and tapers sharply down to smaller rays as it goes back. the calicos usually have very distinct light round shaped spots on the top of their bodies which are usually still visible after they have been caught. Olive rf also have a very distinct midline as well, almost like the fish has stitches running down its side. On the calico its not as easy to spot. to me, calicos always appear kind of silvery and shiny on the bottom of their bodies while the olive usually looks brownish / yellowish, kind of dull compared to a calico.

i wonder how he cooked em, now i am hungry!

Where I was fooled wsa the dissappearance of the spots on the dorsal side after a couple hours on my deck. 

I "knew" they were calicos when i got them, and questioned it later, when I downloaded the pictures to my computer..

Great thread on Fish ID, though.

I sure am glad they are not actually bocaccio's considering the limit on them is one fish....

John thanks for that pic....these were the dsame fish, same golden color around the mouth and chin....I dooked em up as usual, flour, egg, italian bread crumbs....my kids love it that way!

sure you didn't post that pic just to show off the FINE brace of lings there, buddy??

Allen

Where I was fooled wsa the dissappearance of the spots on the dorsal side after a couple hours on my deck. 

I "knew" they were calicos when i got them, and questioned it later, when I downloaded the pictures to my computer..

Great thread on Fish ID, though.

I sure am glad they are not actually bocaccio's considering the limit on them is one fish....

John thanks for that pic....these were the dsame fish, same golden color around the mouth and chin....I dooked em up as usual, flour, egg, italian bread crumbs....my kids love it that way!

sure you didn't post that pic just to show off the FINE brace of lings there, buddy??

Allen

scout's honor Allen!

you are the only one i have heard of landing more than one calico per day with a hook and line in monterey. i hear of folks getting one here and there but for someone to get more than one in a day is amazing.

i hope you marked the spot and enjoy it til the mpa's kick in. i have been diving on some reefs on cannery row which hold these fish well for a few years now. never fails in good and bad visibility they are there. getting them is another story

i had some gps waypoints before my gps took on water and now i dont but i sure did enjoy that area a lot.

just curious, how do you like the meat on those fish as opposed to rockfish?

john

Mooch,
The picture of the calico you posted is very characteristic of a juvenile calico, the big boys take on a lot more color on the belly and you almost never see any white like that on a bigger calico.  If your lucky and have a camera on hand they could have a very beautiful golden color that can be very bright.  Sometimes when fish are found on the edges of their range they can look a little darker than usual.  There are a lot of examples of color variation as with rockfish in "The Rockfishes of the Northeast Pacific" by Love, Yoklavich and Thorsteinson. (By the way, at only $25, everyone on this site should own this book!!!!)

By the way Joel, nice lookin' calico!

to me the big differentiator is the shape of the anal fin.

the olive has a rockfish looking fin, the calico's sweeps back.

J

Aaron,

How far of a paddle is it from Moss to Pajaro for those flatties in close?

SCAllen,

Just for you  info. you can have 10 kelp bass (Aka Calico) but must be 12" min.
It is a rare catch up here.  But, one of the PB got a 10 lb.  Dodo (Aka Dorado...Mahi Mahi) on the troll.  So the water is warm.  Probably see yellowtails (not talking about the rockcod) and maybe a marlin or two.  Marlin is a BIG IF.

Ken kickfish