Tag Archives: Washington Dungeness Crab Fishermen’s Association
Dungeness crab at $5.99/lb. Nice! But crab fishers get $2/lb. Tough deal.
Remember a year ago, and the $18.99 up to $24.50 a pound prices? When you hear about a “market correction,” here it is in a dramatic display: a plunge of two-thirds or more. There are plenty of reasons why. For the Dungeness crab fishers, a number of them small operators, it’s tough days. They’re getting $2 a pound, maybe $2.25 a pound wholesale for the crabs. In last winter’s boom times they were getting $5.50 a pound from processors. “I haven’t seen this low a price in over a decade. It’d probably be cheaper not to fish. But we can’t not fish, if that makes sense. We have to keep making our payments or we’ll end up in a loss,” says Jennifer Custer, who does the bookkeeping while her husband, Chuck Custer, runs their 46-foot fishing boat, the Miss Kathleen, out of Westport. >click to read< 09:43
Crabbers battling on several fronts
This is an announcement directed at the Washington Dungeness Crab Fishermen’s Association general membership. We have a meeting, Wednesday, Jan. 17, from 2 to 5 p.m. at the Ocean Center, 1600 N. Montesano St. in Westport. Washington coastal crabbers have endured overwhelming changes in management and profitability over the last 10-15 years. The one thing Washington crabbers could count on year to year was the unknown. >click here to read< 10:21
Washington Crabbers Join Peers In Tackling Whale Entanglement Risk
Earlier this year, a gray whale calf died after getting tangled in crab pot lines near Seaview, Washington. Now commercial and tribal crab fishermen from the Washington coast have agreed to form a working group to discuss how to reduce the risk of a repeat. Fleets in Oregon and California have previously formed similar work groups. Whale numbers along the West Coast are rebounding, but so are sightings of humpback whales, gray whales and the odd blue whale entangled in fishing lines and buoys. click here to read the story 08:55
