I got a letter the other day that said they'd sent my seabass head down to Hubbs Sea World Research Institute and it did have a tag. The fish was from Marina Del Rey, believe it or not, and was only 3.74 years old which was young for its size (30.7" according to their calculation, 32" according to my tape measure...). They're estimated weight was 8.25 pounds. Pete's scale weighed it at 8-7. Since it's release from MDR, the fish grew 19.53 inches, or about 0.017 inches/day. It was at liberty for 1,153 days. Very cool, I think. Please turn in your seabass heads, at 1933 Cliff Drive, Suite 9. Ask for Dave Ono (feel free to walk in with a trash bag...). Very little is known about seabass growth, migration, behavior etc. so everything helps. You can not tell if your fish is tagged by looking at it. It's a microscopic implant which is put in the fish when they're just a couple inches long. They'd also like the non-tagged heads also, so it doesn't really matter if it's tagged or not. They still like to examine "normal" wsb heads.
-Brian