New gear could help save California's crab season while keeping whales safe

SAN FRANCISCO (KGO) -- Efforts to protect migrating whales from becoming entangled in fishing lines, is once again cutting short the spring crab season off the California coast. But now, a potential solution could be around the corner.

Commercial crabber Brand Little has been fishing for the past two spring seasons with an experimental technology known as pop-up traps. Unlike the floating vertical trap lines that can sometimes entangle migrating whales, the pop-up buoys sit on the ocean floor with the crab traps. When they're ready, fishermen release the buoys by remote control, pulling the trap line to the surface and allowing them to safely haul in the traps. Newer test versions now allow fisherman to string long lines of traps to a single buoy.

"This year the commission really went out on a limb and authorized our full stack so we'll be able to fish 450 pots on ground lines for the pop-up program, and it's been a long time since we fish 450 pots in California, so we're excited," says Little.

The pilot program is now expanding from fewer than 20 boats last spring to as many as 40 boats this year, with the potential for full approval by next season. Geoff Shester, Ph.D. is with the environmental nonprofit Oceana and has been involved in the testing.

"So that would basically open it up so that everyone who wants to keep fishing in the springtime, even when the season's closed to conventional gear, can keep going and keep catching crab with the pop-up gear," Shester explains.

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He says that balancing act is becoming critical. With studies suggesting that whales are often being pushed closer to the shore by changing ocean conditions, making them more vulnerable to being hit by ships or becoming entangled in fishing lines.

"We can't just keep doing the same thing every year and expect the numbers to go down. There're still too many entanglements, and the state can really do more to reduce the amount of time that the vertical lines can be out there so that the fishermen can go in, get their crab, and then we can transition to pop up gear for the springtime," Shester argues.

Because of increased entanglements, crab fisherman have been limited to using roughly half their traditional gear during the first part of the season. The hope is that expanding volume in the spring, could help them survive in a business with extremely tight margins.

"So we as a fleet of driving the ship a little bit, they're saying, hey, we want the tool but we want it only for the spring. So it looks like we're going to get that. And come April one, they'll be able to authorize it for everybody to use," says little.

The advanced systems now also include app-based tracking. That allows makes it easier for fishermen to deploy and retrieve their lines without encroaching on another boat's traps.