Local Kelp Beds Weather El Nino : Ocean: But shell fishing in Northern California is hurt by the weather condition. Warming could give a boost to San Diego sport-fishing industry.

The continuing El Nino weather condition has hurt shell-fishing operations in Northern California, but the potentially devastating weather event has had relatively little effect locally, according to spokesmen for companies that are dependent upon the Pacific Ocean.

Local kelp beds are growing slower than usual offshore, but El Nino’s impact on the local sea urchin industry has been blunted by colder water in recent months near the ocean’s bottom.

The El Nino weather condition, the warming of the Pacific that occurs every three to five years, could bode well for San Diego’s sport-fishing fleet, which reported a dismal year in 1991 because highly sought-after game fish are more likely to migrate north to the ocean off San Diego.

“El Nino has had a much bigger impact in Northern California than here,” said Dave Rudie, a spokesman for San Diego-based Catalina Offshore Products, which processes sea urchins harvested offshore from the county. The local sea urchin harvest has remained healthy, largely because “bottom temperatures have remained pretty cold” in recent months, Rudie said.

That hasn’t been the case in Northern California, when typically cold waters were warmed by El Nino, reducing harvests of sea urchin. “Instead of getting 10 pounds (of usable product) per hundred pounds harvested, they’re getting 5 pounds or less,” Rudie said.

El Nino has slowed the growth of kelp that San Diego-based Kelco harvests from beds off Point Loma, La Jolla, Del Mar and Leucadia. But it has not devastated the beds as it did in 1983.

Then, winter storms whipped up by the weather system tore kelp plants from the ocean bottom. Plants that survived the storms were then battered by higher-than-average water temperatures.

Unlike 1983, “we’ve got an excellent number of plants this year,” said Ron McPeak, a marine biologist with Kelco, a San Diego-based company that harvests kelp for use in industrial applications including food additives. Ocean temperatures rose noticeably near the surface earlier in the year, but temperatures near the bottom have remained “reasonably cool,” McPeak said.

“We’re quite optimistic now,” McPeak said. “But we’re not through this yet.”

Although El Nino has slowed kelp bed growth, it might give the local sport-fishing fleet a much-needed boost.

“El Nino has brought us the warm waters, which brought us the exotic species we typically don’t catch (on one-day trips) until July and August,” said Paul Robbins, sales manager of H&M; Sportfishing Landings, which is home to about 20 charter boats.

Sport-fishing boats that fish offshore from San Diego are reporting catches that include dorado and yellow tail.

Last year, tuna never moved north out of tropical waters that are accessible only to fishermen who spend days--if not weeks--on fishing trips. “What the overall effect will be (on the upcoming tuna season) is anyone’s guess,’ Robbins said. “But the early showing of dorado and yellowtail makes us more optimistic.”

If past El Nino conditions are any guide, San Diego’s good fortune will translate to bad luck elsewhere.

“If it’s good news for San Diego, some other California fisheries will crash,” said Mia Tegner, a marine biologist with the Scripps Institution of Oceanography. In 1983, when the last major El Nino occurred, certain squid, mackerel, anchovy, crab and shrimp fisheries were hurt, Tegner said.