Crab season aboard Khevin Mellegers’ boat, the Areona. This spring was his second time trying out experimental “pop-up” crab pots. (Courtesy of Khevin Mellegers)The first time Half Moon Bay crabber Khevin Mellegers heard about the whale-safe, ropeless crabbing gear commonly called pop-up pots, he was intrigued. It was about a decade ago, not long after humpback whales started showing up in Northern California waters during Dungeness crabbing season—and inevitably getting tangled in crab pot lines. Crabbers like Mellegers had weathered shortened seasons and gear restrictions meant to protect the whales. Coupled with the multi-year closure of the salmon fishery, his financial outlook was grim, and he was emotionally drained by all the closures. The choice was to get out of crabbing—or put his money on this newfangled gear, which promised to keep crabbers crabbing. But he got cold feet. The idea of pop-ups had first popped up in a working group to devise whale-safe gear that Mellegers was part of—a collaboration among crabbers, conservationists, engineers, and the California Department of Fish and Wildlife (CDFW). But the close-knit crabbing community has been slow to warm to new pots, as Bay Nature found in speaking with more than a dozen NorCal crabbers. The vocal majority of the fleet opposed them in recent years, with worries about high cost and injuries, and skepticism that they’d even work. Open antagonism from many fleet members dissuaded crabbers like Mellegers who were more pop-up-curious. Only one crabber tried out the first prototype in 2021. In 2023, two crabbers braved their community’s ire. Some who did trial the gear say their boats and gear were damaged in retaliatory acts by disgruntled fellow crabbers.  At last the idea is gaining steam. In 2024, Mellegers and 18 other commercial Dungeness crabbers working from Point Concepcion to the California–Oregon border tried out pop-up pots during the spring Dungeness season, which runs April to May. Now the results from the state’s experimental gear trial are in—and they look promising. Crabbers report a steep but short learning curve. In 2023, Mellegers’ first go-around with the gear, he was crabbing alone and unsure he’d be able to manage the line with multiple pots on his own. Most challenging were the logistics of handling all the new gear, which he describes as a game of Tetris on a tightly packed boat: “You’re dealing with buckets of line traps, traps with retrofit[ters], buoys, how to store them, how to set them up [in relation] to where you’re going to be sitting,” he says.  But after a few tries—and getting a few more hands on deck—he says: “It was a breeze.”  Many a Bay Area holiday Dungeness feast has been in the past decade delayed or shortened commercial crab seasons, triggered by heightened risks to whales and domoic acid in the meat. Both problems have been linked with warmer ocean waters. (Kate Golden)New pots are a response to a new problem California fishing communities suffer from the effects of climate change: rising seas, extreme weather, and a warming ocean directly impact their lives and livelihoods. The infamously warm Pacific ocean waters of 2015–2016 (often called “the Blob”), triggered algal blooms along West Coast shores. Crabs’ ingestion of the algal neurotoxin domoic acid has triggered season delays since then. The Blob also led to exploding populations of anchovies near West Coast shores—which in turn enticed whales into coastal waters, just when and where crabbers traditionally lowered their pots. Whales got entangled. The CDFW was forced to restrict the type of gear crabbers used, the number of pots, and the length of the seasons. Crabbers have reported losing up to 80 percent of their annual income. And the whales keep arriving earlier, delaying the crab fishery—this year is no exception—possibly because of changing climate cues, though researchers are still working out why. In 2023, Dungeness crab pot lines ensnared at least 10 of the 27 whales that were documented as entangled off the coasts of Washington, Oregon, and California. By the end of 2024, the CDFW had documented 14 entangled humpback whales in California, four of which were confirmed Dungeness crab pot lines. Traditional crab traps are stacked up in Noyo Harbor, Fort Bragg, in March 2024. (Amy Elisabeth Moore)Traditional crab pots have lines that extend from the pot on the seafloor up to a buoy at the surface. With pop-ups, the line remains coiled on the pot. To retrieve the pot, the crabber signals a transducer to release the line. The line pops up to the surface and the crabber reels the pot to the boat. Bart Chadwick, co-owner of Sub Sea Sonics, one of several companies that is trialing pop-up pots, says he initially treated the task as a technical problem. Which it is, in part. But it is also a human problem: finding a solution that’s “commensurate with all the requirements for fishing—and (then) getting people to accept that, and then getting the state to accept it,” he said. How it went: pretty well! The technology seems to have worked in the spring trial. Gear makers Sub Sea Sonic and Guardian Ropeless Systems reported that 98 percent of the 23,048 deployed pots were retrieved. That’s actually better than traditional pots’ annual loss rate of 5–10 percent, according to CDFW data. And crabbers BN spoke with were happy with their haul and profit for the spring season.   This year, costs have come down, putting pop-ups in range of traditional gear, according to Chadwick. “We’ve got the gear at a price point now where it’s not uneconomical [for] fishermen. [It] adds about $100 or so, and should last many years,” he said. Crabbers who used the pop-up gear find the outlay for the upgrade (about $1000 per sled, which can hold up to fifty pots) canceled out other costs (such as buoys and vertical lines for the fifty pots).  Crew member Jonathan Tim, holding a pallet, prepares pop-up pots aboard Pale Horse, captained by Brand Little, in April 2024. (Brand Little)Crucially, crabbers using the pop-up pots reported no injuries, said Geoff Shester, senior scientist for Oceana, an environmental advocacy organization, which has collaborated on the project since 2015. This spring, the CDFW is expanding the gear trial to 40 vessels, says Ryan Bartling, CDFW senior environmental scientist. The agency also is endorsing an additional ten pots per line (for a total of 20 pots), and more pots per boat. While the agency isn’t likely to make everyone use the pots, officials hope to find a solution which will allow crabbers to harvest through the end of the spring season. Agency officials feel “stuck in the middle” between the two camps, Bartling says. “There’s this tug of war between those that want to fish pop-up, and those that want to have a traditional fishery only.” He says the agency is working toward authorizing pop-up pots for widespread use as an “alternative gear” in future spring seasons.  Meanwhile, the nearly tenfold increase in trial participants this year suggests the fleet’s growing acceptance of the new gear. “Having 19 people go out and actually try the gear has been really phenomenal,” Chadwick says. The working group received “a tremendous amount of feedback” from the crabbers with pointers on how to improve the gear. Left, crew members prepare pop-up pots on Jacqueline, Stephen Melz’s 58-foot vessel; right, in April 2024, Jacqueline’s crew reel in pop-up pots. (Courtesy of Stephen Melz) Stephen Melz, of Half Moon Bay, participated in the experimental gear pilot for a second time this spring. It took him and his crew a couple of tries. “We did it the wrong way twice,” he admitted ruefully, “setting it off the boats the wrong way” and not knowing how to disconnect the crab pots from the groundline. But after that, Melz caught a lot of crabs with the pop-ups—and he didn’t lose a single pot. “It’s amazing,” he said. “We started the season with 150 pots. We brought 150 pots back in.” When the season wrapped up, “I was so sad to sack out,” Melz says. “We caught a whole bunch of crabs. And it was exciting to do it.”Bay Nature spoke to plenty of crabbers who didn’t try the experimental gear and don’t plan to—they’re still skeptical. “We can solve the [entanglement] problem without increased costs,” says longtime commercial crabber Tony Anello. “And that’s because we know what we’re doing. Basically, we’ve been in the game long enough.” But Melz hopes pop-up pots will keep the spring season open, effectively doubling crabbers’ time on the ocean. “I was completely impressed with this. It was amazing. Given the opportunity to fish either pop-up gear or traditional gear in the spring, I would take up the pop-up any day of the week.”

Yet again this winter, Dungeness season was delayed to keep whales safe. In a surprising turn after years of adamant resistance, more Dungeness crabbers are trying out—and pretty darn happy with—new pots designed to keep humpbacks from getting entangled. The post In Surprising Turn, Crabbers Take to Whale-Safe Crab Pots appeared first on Bay Nature.