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Rockfishes
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BODY oblong, more or less compressed, the head large, and with one or more pairs of ridges above, which usually terminate in spines; opercle usually with 2 spinous processes, preopercle with 4 or 5; mouth terminal, usually large, with villiform teeth on jaws and vomer; premaxillaries protractile; maxillary broad, without supplemental bone; gill-openings wide, extending forward below; gill-membranes separate, free from the isthmus; scales ctenoid or sometimes cycloid; lateral line continuous, concurrent with the back; a narrow bony stay extending backward from the suborbital toward the preopercle; dorsal fin continuous, sometimes very deeply notched; pseudobranchiae large; air-bladder usually present.
This is a very large family, with about 30 genera and 250 species, inhabiting all seas, especially abundant in the temperate parts of the Pacific, where they form a large proportion of the fish-fauna. The species are of large or moderate size, and all are non-migratory, living about rocks or among the algae. Many of the species are of food-value, though some are reputed poisonous. Many of them are viviparous, the young being produced when about 1/4 inch long.
The family is most numerously represented on our California coast. In our waters are 8 genera with about 85 species, only a small proportion, however, are of much, if any, food-value. None of them is regarded as a game-fish. We treat the family only briefly.
b. Dorsal spines 15 or 16; vertebrae about 12+19; ..........Sebastes
The only important species of the family on our Atlantic Coast is Sebastes marinus, known as the rose-fish, redfish, snapper, red perch, Norway haddock, hemdurgan, bream or John Dory.
It is a fish of wide distribution and is found in northern Europe and from Iceland to middle New Jersey. It is most abundant northward, where it is a shallow water species; southward it is found only in deeper water, and is less common. Its temperature range conforms pretty closely with that of the halibut.
The rosefish reaches 2 feet in length, though the average is much less. Their food consists chiefly of crustaceans, small fish, and mollusks to some extent, and in turn, the young of this species constitute an important part of the food of the cod, and they are at all ages preyed upon by halibut and other large predaceous fishes of cold regions.
The rosefish ranks well as a food-fish, and considerable quantities of them are taken on the New England coast. The most extensive fisheries are on the Greenland coast, where the flesh is highly esteemed, and the spines are used as needles. They may be caught on hand or trawl-lines, with almost any kind of bait. They breed in summer in deep holes in Massachusetts Bay, and elsewhere along the New England coast.