October-December 2004 California Agriculture magazine

Race for Dungeness crab unlikely to slow down this winter

Each year starting in mid-November, fishermen launch from ports along the Pacific Coast in a furious race for a precious marine resource: Dungeness crab. By December’s end, they will have trapped up to 80% of the entire 7-month season’s crab harvest. The result is fishing in dangerous conditions, excess traps crowding the fishing grounds and glutted markets early in the season.
California Sea Grant–funded researchers with UC Davis and Humboldt State University have been working with the California Dungeness crab fishery participants to explore potential solutions for the early-season rush for Dungeness crab. In a peer-reviewed survey published in the October-December 2004 issue of the University of California’s California Agriculture journal, they report that a majority of Dungeness crab fishermen would support just two of 12 management measures to spread out the catch more evenly throughout the season: a trap-limit for all sized vessels (70% in favor) and daylight-only fishing (64% in favor).

The current issue of California Agriculture, including PDF versions of all peer-reviewed research articles, can be viewed in full online at: http://CaliforniaAgriculture.ucop.edu/0404OND/toc.html

Despite years of discussion and debate about limiting the number of traps that each vessel may carry, on Sept. 23 Governor Schwarzenegger vetoed a bill that would have established a 250-trap limit for all boats in central California, on an experimental basis. “While the majority of vessel owners viewed trap limits favorably, most owners of vessels longer than 50 feet considered this an unjustified restriction on their business and a way to reallocate crab to operators of smaller boats,” said Christopher Dewees, the survey’s lead author and Sea Grant marine fisheries specialist at UC Davis.
The authors received completed surveys from 243 fishermen, about 40% of the state’s crab fleet. In November 2002, respondents were asked to rate their views on 12 management measures on a scale from one to five, as well as maintaining the current management system.
For now, the early-season race persists. “Dungeness crab is among the most valuable of Pacific Coast fisheries,” Dewees said. “While Dungeness crab stocks appear to be sustainable under current fishing rules, the race for crab may continue to be exacerbated by declines in other fisheries.”
Dewees and his colleagues in Sea Grant Extension have collaborated with stakeholders on several controversial fisheries issues, including the race for Dungeness crab, potential new approaches to managing the sea urchin fishery, and implementation of the state’s landmark Marine Life Management Act of 1998. “These three cases involve highly contentious marine-fisheries management issues in which extension has been able to play a key role in the search for potential solutions,” Dewees said.
Different approaches were taken in each case, always with an eye toward developing and maintaining the trust of all stakeholders and promoting science-based, collaborative approaches. These efforts are described in another peer-reviewed article in the October-December 2004 issue of California Agriculture. “If you advocate on an issue, or are even just perceived as an advocate for one side or another, you quickly lose credibility with all the stakeholders,” Dewees said. Contact: C. Dewees, cmdewees@ucdavis.edu or (530) 752-1497.

In addition, the October-December 2004 issue of California Agriculture
includes the following peer-reviewed articles:

Farm-to-school connections work: An evaluation of a comprehensive program incorporating school gardens, cafeterias and local farms in Davis, Calif., elementary schools provides evidence to support its positive impact on student nutrition and education.
Contact: Heather Graham, hegraham@ucdavis.edu or (530) 752-2666.

Food stamp education gets results: Food stamp clients receiving FSNEP training showed significant improvements in several measures of dietary quality, and money saved on food purchases.
Contact: Amy Joy, abjoy@ucdavis.edu or (530) 752-7959.

Teens learn to teach kids science: 4-H teenagers learned to effectively administer Animal Ambassadors, a hands-on, science-education outreach program that emphasizes the Scientific Thinking Processes.
Contact: Martin Smith, mhsmith@ucdavis.edu or (530) 752-6894.

Ant baits work in grape, citrus: Several low-toxicity baits, including one formulated with anchovies plus imidacloprid, effectively controlled Argentine ants or field ants. Such ants are a concern because they tend and protect certain pests in grape and citrus, collecting the honeydew the pests excrete.
Contact: Kristen Tollerup, kristen.tollerup@email.ucr.edu or (951) 827-3217.

GPS accurately maps weeds: An innovative system utilizes a digital camera, global positioning system and special software to map weeds in a cotton field with about 85% accuracy.
Contact: David Slaughter, dcslaughter@ucdavis.edu or (530) 752-5553.

n the first long-term evaluation of its kind, UC Cooperative Extension’s “degree-day” forecast for cotton growers in the southern Central Valley was reliable more than 90% of the time when compared with actual, observed weather conditions from 1998 to 2002. Contact: Doug Munier, (530) 865-1107 or djmunier@ucdavis.edu