La pêche du thon a l'appât vivant en Californie

From February 22nd to April 2nd, 1956, we studied tuna fishing with live bait, as practiced by "tuna-clippers" from the Californian harbour of San Diego. This fishing deals only with two species: the albacore, "yellowfin Tuna" (Neothunnus macropterus) and the skipjack (Katsuwonus pelamis); little tunnies, "black skipjacks" (Euthynnus alleteratus), can also be found, either within an albacore or skipjack shoal, or by themselves. When these fishes are caught, they are either thrown overboard or used as bait (fig, 1). The lower limit weights for these two commercial species are respectively 3.400 kg for albacores and 1.800 kg for skipjacks. Yellowfin tuna can reach weights of up to 180 kg; but these catches are pretty unusual and the average weight is 13 to 18 kg; its market price was set at 320 dollars per US tonne (1.016 kg) in 1953, whereas a tonne of skipjack is worth 280 dollars.