California loves Dungeness crab. But concerns over whale safety have put the industry in peril

The Dungeness crab season had opened just a few weeks earlier, two months behind schedule, and was off to a slow start. “We’re working very hard to basically get nothing,” said Ogg. Early on a Thursday in late January, Ogg readied his 54-foot fiberglass boat, the Karen Jeanne, for a 16-hour day of hauling 200 crab pots. It was barely 4:30 a.m. at the Spud Point Marina, and Ogg’s crew, Bradlee Titus, 34, and Axel Bjorklund, 22, both multi-generational fishermen, prepared the deck by washing equipment, filling water buckets and packing jars with bait — a stinky, oily mashup of mackerel and squid. At the helm, Ogg tracked water currents and the weather forecast as he moved the boat out of Bodega Bay, past Point Reyes toward the Farallon Islands and San Francisco skyline. Photos, more, >>CLICK TO READ<< 07:09

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