138K green crabs pulled from Washington waters … so far in 2022 – KUOW

The battle to rid our waters of the invasive European green crabs is making some headway. Losing this battle could mean the end of Dungeness Crab and many other creatures in the Salish Sea. Luckily the State and Tribes are taking this very seriously, as they should.


So far this year, Washington’s Department of Fish and Wildlife says more than 138,000 European green crabs have been removed from Washington waters. It’s a considerable increase in green crabs captured locally than previously reported this year. A total of 85,000 were captured near Bellingham last year. (KUOW) 

European green crab invasion report. Lummi’s in trouble, still ok here

The recent discovery of a huge increase in invasive green crabs on the Lummi tidelands has not been seen in waters here. A good update by Sea Grant. Wendy Feltham who has been volunteering locally had this to say: “I’ve been part of a small team looking for the invasive European Green Crab at Kala Point Lagoon for the past six years. In all those years we’ve handled thousands of shore crabs and a few others, but only one European Green Crab.”

Invasive European Green Crab (Photo courtesy of WDFW)

Here’s the report from the Lummi. The link is at the bottom of the quote.

December 6, 2021

The recent report by the Lummi Nation of more than 70,000 European green crabs captured this year has many wondering what this could mean for efforts to prevent green crabs from establishing in the Salish Sea. This number certainly indicates that the population of green crabs within the sea pond on the Lummi Reservation has grown exponentially since their first detection in 2019 (Mueller and Jefferson, 2019), and currently represents the largest population along inland Washington shorelines. The disaster declaration made by the Lummi Indian Business Council, highlights both the threat to tribal resources, and the need for increased control measures to effectively protect both the reservation, as well as the region, from accelerated spread and impacts of the invasion.

https://wsg.washington.edu/21-lummi-update/

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