Black Rockfish

Black rockfish are considered BOFFFFs, big old fat, fecund, female fish. In many fish species, older and larger females produce many more eggs than younger adult females. This is because a newly sexually mature female will still be putting a lot of their energy into their own growth while older females switch most of that energy to reproduction. At birth, the larvae are able to feed on zooplankton right away, but these can be hard to find, so they are very vulnerable to starvation at the start of life. Older females provide their larvae with larger oil globules than younger females. The oil globule provides them with energy at this vulnerable early life stage, so that larvae from older females have nearly three times higher survival rates. In addition, they grow nearly four times faster than larvae from younger females.

These fish form schools with thousands of individuals, and often include yellowtail, dusky, silvergray, and blue rockfishes.