‘Soft’ crabs delay Dungeness season opener

PRINCETON-BY-THE-SEA -- The sun rose over Pillar Point Harbor this morning, the official start of Dungeness crab season, but no one went fishing.

Word that the crab just offshore were still "soft" tripped up the market and may lead to days or weeks of delay, said local fisherman Duncan Maclean.

"There's less meat, it's more chalky. There's no butter in them and the butter is what people are crazy about," he said.
The good news is that crab are plentiful this year and just need more time to mature.

Recreational fishermen, whose Dungeness fishing season started weeks ago, say the ocean floor is choked with adult male crab. Fishing boats have come from as far away as Alaska to take advantage of it.

But out-of-town fishermen, as well as those in Half Moon Bay, San Francisco and Bodega Bay, kept their boats tied up while they sent a small number of crab to be tested by a processor this morning.

Ideally, a crab has 25 percent of its body weight composed of meat. That's not happening so far, said Tom Mattusch, captain of the Huli Cat, a sport boat docked in Half Moon Bay.

"We cooked some up the other day. The legs were fine, but the body almost collapsed on itself," said Mattusch.

Fishermen are eager to satisfy the crab cravings of the Thanksgiving market. But they don't want to undercut their own price advantage with inferior crab. Nor do they want to disappoint crab lovers.

"We're doing our best to make sure the public gets the best quality of crab they can," said Maclean.

Dungeness crab take two to three years to grow into adulthood. They molt late in the spring and are generally mature by now. Fishermen theorize that some crab have had trouble maturing this year because they are so numerous and have to compete for a limited amount of food out in the ocean.

Crabbers will have the test results by noon today and could decide to go fishing by the afternoon, said Maclean. They are more likely to wait a few days until the Bay Area's choice crustaceans are good enough to eat.

Contact Julia Scott at 650-348-4340

Photo caption: File: Crab fishermen load crab traps onto their boat at Fisherman's Wharf November 15, 2007 in San Francisco, California. (Photo by Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)