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Lived to tell about it!
Question: Lived to tell about it! A few weeks ago while surf fishing, I was fortunate to catch a 6-pound female cabezon off the Mendocino Coast.
My wife and I poached the meat and the eggs for a sumptuous meal. It tasted great!
But then from five to 13 hours afterward we suffered severe vomiting and diarrhea.
Unbeknownst to us and all of my fishing friends, the eggs of a cabezon are toxic, no matter how much they are cooked. Even other mammals will not touch the eggs. Eating the meat is OK.
We were hospitalized but are now OK, except for a complete future aversion to cabezon eggs!
Have you ever heard of this before? A toxicology doctor is writing a paper about us.
Thank you so much and I always look forward to reading your column! (Dale J., Oakland)
Answer: Wow, this was news to me and to most people I mentioned it to.
Since receiving your letter, I’ve done some research and found that cabezon eggs are indeed poisonous to humans, as well as many other mammals and birds.
The term for fish roe poisoning is ichthyootoxism.
People who have eaten the roe and developed symptoms soon afterwards describe: abdominal pain, nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, intense thirst, bitter taste, trouble swallowing, cold sweats, rapid irregular weak pulse, dilated pupils, fainting, chest pain, pale skin, tinnitus, etc. Yikes!
In severe cases, muscular cramps, convulsions and coma have occurred. Victims usually recover within five days, but deaths have also been reported.
To most of us, cabezon are a popular game fish and delicious dinner fare. They occur statewide and typically hunker down in rugged rocks and kelp beds in shallow waters less than 100 feet deep, but may range out to 250 feet.
Female cabezon lay their eggs in very shallow water, so the evolution of toxic roe is likely one of their clever adaptations to help protect their eggs from would-be predators.
Male cabezon then bravely guard the nests and chase away most threats to their incubating offspring. If the eggs are laid in water too low for the protective dad to guard at low tide, they could be preyed upon by a variety of unsuspecting hungry birds and small mammals.
Famed ichthyologist Dr. Carl Hubbs describes in his article, “Toxicity of the roe of the Cabezon, Scorpaenichthys marmoratus” (California Fish and Game 37: 195-196) that in 1923 he and his wife Laura caught a ripe adult female cabezon and cooked it up for dinner.
The two of them ate the roe while Laura’s parents and a young child ate the flesh. Those who consumed the flesh suffered no discomfort, but for Hubbs and his wife, it was another story.
He described it as “an unhappy gastronomic experience” and said they “awoke in misery about four hours afterward and were violently ill throughout the rest of the night, with rapidly alternating chills and fever and with frequent vomiting and diarrhea. Both were left very weak in the morning but gradually recovered during the day, with no residual or recurrent symptoms.”
In 1949, a large female cabezon loaded with ripe roe was collected at Scripps Institution Reef. Scientists remembering Hubbs’ experience decided to conduct an experiment to test the toxicity of the roe on 12 rats and two guinea pigs.
In addition to their regular food, the rats and guinea pigs were given a cocktail containing the roe mixed with water. Four of the rats and one of the guinea pigs died, and all of the animals exhibited diarrhea and nasal discharge.
Now don’t let the horrors of the toxic symptoms you encountered scare you away from cabezon because they are pretty cool fish. They can grow to more than three feet long, weight more than 25 pounds and they come in brown, red or green with lots of darker mottling to help with camouflage.
Females are larger and usually more greenish while the males are more reddish. Females lay large masses of eggs that may be white, pink, red, maroon or blue-green initially but mature to a more olive color. Cabezon also have smooth skin without scales and they are really fun to catch!
Even better, when filleted, their flesh is usually blue or green but then turns white once cooked.
People always ask why their skin and flesh is blue or green and Dr. Milton Love, researcher at U.C. Santa Barbara, wrote in his book, Probably More Than You Want to Know about the Fishes of the Pacific Coast, “The blue color of cabezon flesh is harmless and disappears when the meat is cooked. The color may come from copper-based compounds in the shellfish they consume.”
In addition, cabezon remains are common in Native American middens.
Yep, cabezon are cool … just don’t eat their roe!
Carrie Wilson is a marine environmental scientist with the California Department of Fish and Wildlife. While she cannot personally answer everyone’s questions, she will select a few to answer each week in this column. Please contact her at
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- Written by: Carrie Wilson
LAKEPORT, Calif. – Clear Lake Scullers will offer a summer adult rowing camp.
The camp sessions will take place from Friday, June 27, through Saturday, June 29, and Friday, July 11, through Saturday, July 13.
Friday sessions will be held 7 to 9 a.m. and 5 to 7 p.m., while Saturday and Sunday sessions take plae from 8 to 10 a.m.
There will be a paddling, rowing and water safety camp for youth and high schoolers the same weekends as the adult rowing camp, taking place from 10 a.m. to noon.
The boatyard is in Lakeport at Main and 7th streets. Look for the boats down by the lake.
The community-based rowing club offering instruction and access to rowing, paddling, canoeing, kayaking and sailing equipment.
Membership is open to the public with year-round programs for adults and summer programs for youth.
The goal of Clear Lake Scullers is to provide broad access to beautiful Clear Lake by exposing people to a wide variety of aquatic sports with emphasis on safety, competence and recreation, as well as teaching the skills necessary for athletes to train and race at the collegiate, masters, or national level.
Adult membership is $100 for the summer, $200 for the full year, and includes sweep rowing camp and additional instruction in sculling and the use of a large array of club equipment, including rowing shells, surf skis, paddle boards, wind surfers and canoes.
Check the Web site at www.clearlakescullers.org or contact Mike Sullivan at 707-349-9779 or
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KELSEYVILLE, Calif. – On Saturday, June 21, Clear Lake State Park will host a summer nature walk, giving visitors the opportunity to observe the diverse plant and animal life in the park.
State Parks docent Billy Gear will lead the two-hour long walk, which will begin at 8:30 a.m. at the Visitor Center parking lot and take a leisurely pace along Cole Creek, Kelsey Creek and Kelsey Creek Slough.
The walk will cover about one mile of paved road and established trails.
Participants should wear sturdy shoes and bring binoculars and water.
Clear Lake State Park is located at 5300 Soda Bay Road, Kelseyville.
The entry fee to the park is waived for those participating in the walk.
Anyone having special needs should contact the Clear Lake State Park Sector Office Tuesday through Thursday, 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., at 707-279-2267.
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NORTHERN CALIFORNIA – With extreme drought conditions reducing the cold water supply available, California Department of Fish and Wildlife (CDFW) are moving the last rainbow trout out of the American River Hatchery to avoid future losses of young fish to rising water temperatures.
CDFW biologists predict that by mid-summer the temperature of the water entering the hatchery will exceed tolerable temperatures for the growing fish, causing extensive – if not total – loss of all fish in the hatcheries.
The Fall Run Chinook salmon and steelhead from Nimbus Hatchery have all been released into State waterways.
“We are taking proactive actions to avoid catastrophic fish losses,” said Dr. William Cox, CDFW State Hatchery Program Manager. “It is an unavoidable change, and we need to look for unique opportunities to avert major losses. We will track all changes involved in the evacuation and evaluate how fish react to being released early. Ultimately we could develop new release strategies based on what we learn.”
American River Hatchery operations focus on taking rainbow trout eggs, while Nimbus Hatchery takes both salmon and steelhead eggs. Both hatcheries raise fish to release size.
This will be the first time all stocks of fish at both hatcheries have been evacuated. By the end of this week all fish from both hatcheries will be released with nearly 430,000 fingerling steelhead from Nimbus Hatchery released into the American River, six months ahead of the normal February release time.
The remaining 20 state-managed hatcheries are expected to make it through the summer months and into the winter season without having to evacuate fish.
Normally CDFW would call on the Bureau of Reclamation to draft water from what is known as the “Deep Water Pool,” in the depths of Folsom Lake. The transfer of cold late water helps to keep hatchery waters acceptably cool.
However, this year, the length and intensity of the drought is so extensive that little, if any water, in the lake is expected to be cool enough to utilize during sizzling summer months.
CDFW predicts water temperatures will exceed 78 degrees in the hatcheries – far too warm for the young trout and salmon to survive.
Throughout the fall and winter CDFW workers mark hundreds of thousands of steelhead trout at Nimbus Hatchery.
Unique markings will enable biologists to evaluate what happens to the fish throughout their life cycle and how the drought conditions will ultimately affect each type of fish.
Fall and winter rains, if received in sufficient amounts, will cool water temperatures enough to allow both hatcheries to come back online and resume operations.
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- Written by: Editor