Because they all seem to moult together, they all spend about 24 hours in a vulnerable but more docile state before the new shells harden. The strategy for fishermen would be to catch the crabs just before moulting. Then processors could manipulate the water temperature to try to trigger moulting, and sort crabs for processing as they cast their hard shells. Read the rest here 10:34
NILS STOLPE: The New England groundfish debacle (Part IV): Is cutting back harvest really the answer?
While it’s a fact that’s hardly ever acknowledged, the assumption in fisheries management is that if the population of a stock of fish isn’t at some arbitrary level, it’s because of too much fishing. Hence the term “overfished.” Hence the mandated knee jerk reaction of the fisheries managers to not enough fish; cut back on fishing. What of other factors? They don’t count. It’s all about fishing, because fishing is all that the managers can control; it’s their Maslow’s Hammer. When it comes to the oceans it seems as if it’s about all that the industry connected mega-foundations that support the anti-fishing ENGOs with hundreds of millions of dollars a year in “donations” are interested in controlling. Read the article here
