by Garth Meyer
White sea bass are coming to a grow-pen in King Harbor, with a new structure built and 1,418 tagged fish to be delivered in November.
The complex is 14 feet long by 7 feet wide, with a six-foot deep fiberglass pen in the middle. It is the newest of 10 pens up and down the Southern California Coast for white sea bass, overseen by Hubbs Sea World Research Institute.
“It’s essentially like a big bathtub,” said Clark McNulty, co-director of the $71,000 Redondo Beach project, paid for by the city.
Security fencing is the last piece to be installed, to go in next week.
The young fish are equipped with a scannable numerical code, embedded in a “speck of pepper”-sized chip inserted under their cheekbone. The number reveals where the fish were born, in this case a hatchery in Carlsbad.
The chips are used to determine migratory patterns once the fish are released, at 8-12 inches long.
They arrive at three inches, and will spend 4-6 months in the grow-out pen — which is painted near-black to acclimate the fish to dark water.
A roster of volunteers is being assembled now to feed the sea bass and monitor the pen day-to-day. Information on mortalities, etc., is typed in and sent to Hubbs Institute.
McNulty, who leads the project with Craig Stanton, property manager for Redondo Beach Marina, previously volunteered with the white sea bass program at the former S.E.A. Lab in Redondo; then eventually took over the project when previous managers Rich Ford and John Witaker retired.
The S.E.A. Lab had two (above-ground) tanks.
The new, in-water pen, near Fire Station 3 in the harbor, was built by Coast Construction (Palos Verdes Estates), owned by McNulty.
He is also a co-founder of “Oceans Global,” a Hermosa Beach non-profit formed in 2014, which supports “positive passions” regarding the ocean, after his brother died of a drug overdose. The operation runs an annual South Bay spear-fishing tournament, from which some of the proceeds go to the white sea bass program.
“We might, at some point, build two pens. If the city (concurs),” McNulty said.
How will he determine that the program is successful enough for another pen?
“We may have to circle back on that in six months,” McNulty said. “The scientists will determine how well the fish are doing here. Then it comes down to the city.”
Volunteer information may be found at oceansglobal.org/form.
The Redondo Beach city council approved the project in 2022. The Harbor Commission helped whittle down a list of 12 possible locations in the harbor. ER
Are we no longer worried about disease from these types of farming methods..?