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State’s commercial Dungeness crab fishery to remain closed

Christi Warren, THE PRESS DEMOCRAT
The commercial Dungeness crab fishery will remain closed until the health advisory that halted the season can be lifted for the entire California coast, or south of the Mendocino/Sonoma county line, the state Department of Fish and Wildlife announced Wednesday.
The decision came down thanks to feedback from members of the commercial Dungeness crab fishery, said Jordan Traverso, deputy director of communications for the CDFW.
“Well, it’s way better than it was,” said Stan Carpenter, president of the Fishermen’s Marketing Association of Bodega Bay, noting the action is more fair than opening the season in some places and not others. “It could be better, though. You could close the recreational fishing as well. There are still people eating those crabs.”
“I understand that there are people suffering economic losses from this closure,” Charlton H. Bonham, CDFW Director, said in a press release. “However, the majority of the commercial fleet tells me they want a statewide opener or could live with an opener that adheres to traditional management areas, which would provide the utmost protection against someone falling ill from domoic acid poisoning.”
Source: State’s commercial Dungeness crab fishery to remain closed | The Press Democrat

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Outlook grim for oceanic habitats

Mary Callahan, THE PRESS DEMOCRAT
With the wait underway for federal aid that might help idled fishermen amid the unprecedented closure of California’s commercial Dungeness crab season, scientists and lawmakers assembled at the state capitol Thursday to grapple with other looming hardships ahead for those who make their living on the seas.
Between drought, the increasing warmth and acidity of ocean waters and other factors that have disrupted conditions and wildlife habitat, the outlook is overwhelmingly grim, presenters said at an annual forum of the joint legislative Committee on Fisheries and Aquaculture.
“Something’s going on in the ocean, and it’s not right, and it doesn’t fit our historical understandings,” California Fish and Wildlife Director Chuck Bonham told members of the committee, led by state Sen. Mike McGuire, D-Healdsburg.Bonham noted stretches of coastline suddenly barren of sea urchins, while tropical sea snakes and other warm water species are plying the waters off the California coast. The prolonged algal bloom and resulting neurotoxin that has shut down the state’s commercial crab season is among numerous anomalies that are growing increasingly apparent, Bonham said.
“This should be an … alarm to the general public to stay aware and engaged in this ecological change that’s going on in the ocean,” Bonham said.
Commercial fishermen, especially those on the North Coast, are all too aware of the impacts, having come off a dismal salmon season last summer. The second blow was the postponement of the crab season over human health concerns presented by a naturally occurring neurotoxin called domoic acid that has persisted in a massive algae bloom off the West Coast.
What’s worse, said Clarissa Anderson, an assistant researcher at UC Santa Cruz’s Institute of Marine Sciences, is the record levels of domoic acid follow an overall rise in the neurotoxin since a shift in conditions observed in 1998.
“There have been a few dips in there, but in the last five, six years, we start to see an unprecedented level every year,” Anderson said.
Read more at: Scientists and lawmakers foresee grim outlook for California’s | The Press Democrat

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California’s Dungeness crab season start in doubt due to toxic algae offshore

Mary Callahan, THE PRESS DEMOCRAT

Though such algal blooms occur with some regularity, the size and density of the one this year has been considered especially alarming. It is believed linked to a band of unusually warm water stretching from Alaska to Mexico that has impacted coastal habitats in myriad ways.

With just a week to go before sport anglers can begin setting traps for Dungeness crab, a persistent bloom of toxic red algae off the Pacific Coast is threatening to disrupt the start of the catch and one of California’s most valuable fisheries.
State officials are awaiting test results they hope will come back by midweek before deciding if they will delay the Nov. 7 recreational start, as well as commercial seasons set to begin a week later, Fish and Wildlife personnel said.
Concern about a powerful neurotoxin called domoic acid produced by certain marine algae is driving the deliberations in California and in other regions, including Washington state, where much of the Dungeness crab fishery was closed through the summer because of high levels of domoic acid found in crustaceans there.
Read more at: California’s Dungeness crab season start in doubt due | The Press Democrat