Funding: Total NPRB Funding Requested: $______________ Total Matching Funds Used: $_______________

borealis) rockfish are managed as a species complex rather than as distinct species. Although the effect of lumping them for management purposes on the health of the resources can be evaluated to some degree by the stock assessment surveys conducted regularly by the National Marine Fisheries Service and Alaska Department of Fish and Game (ADF&G), the absence of knowledge about their biology and life histories introduces considerable uncertainty. One approach to better understanding the resource is to examine the population genetic structures of the species. Genetic differences that are geographically based are an indication that breeding (or production) units occupy restricted ranges and that effective management and conservation of the species will avoid over exploitation of those units. In the population genetics work we are completing, which was supported by the Saltonstall-Kennedy Fund, we observed two very distinct forms of rougheye rockfish. These forms had fixed differences at one nuclear (microsatellite locus) that correlated almost perfectly with mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) types that differed substantially from each other. Both rougheye rockfish types were taken in many of the same trawl or longline hauls in some regions. It is nearly certain that these two forms are distinct species, although no obvious morphological difference between the two has yet been noted. Our work, however, indicates that the two forms do no