By GARRET JAROS/YachatsNews
Oregon’s 2024-24 commercial Dungeness crab season is proving quite successful five months into the season.
Fishermen have hauled in 23.8 million pounds of crab so far, accounting for a catch valued at $88.9 million during a season that typically runs from December to August. Crabbers were paid $85 million in 2022-23 and $91.5 million in 2021-22, which was a record.
Newport is the center of Oregon’s Dungeness crab fishery, which is the most valuable of all the coastal fisheries.
“It has been a good season,” Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife’s state fishery manager Troy Buell told YachatsNews. “Pounds landed is well above average, and the value should be our second highest on record — before adjusting for inflation.”
Since the season’s Dec. 16 start, fishermen found crab and netted a good price for their efforts while shoppers caught a break at the market. The average price per pound paid to fishermen in December was $3.41, which translated to about $8 a pound to consumers.
The average price per pound was $4.49 in March and reached $5.68 in April.
“It looks like a lot of crab is selling for $7 a pound ex-vessel (price paid to fishermen) now, which just started in the last week or so but is not an anomaly,” Buell said.
The price climbs as the amount of crab caught drops off — a fact reflected at the market. Fresh caught Dungeness was selling at Newport’s popular South Beach Market this week for $16.95 a pound as the overall catch along the Oregon coast dropped from 1.86 million pounds in March to 498,132 pounds in April.
Garibaldi-based crab boat captain Levi Cherry is happy with the season so far. His two boats, which are permitted to carry 300 crab pots each, have landed just over 170,000 pounds combined for a season average of $4.50 a pound. He and other Garibaldi crabbers are currently getting $7 a pound.
“It’s a pretty successful year at this point in time,” Cherry said of the overall numbers provided by ODFW. “And the average price is pretty big compared to where we were at last year.”
The average price at this point in the season last year was $3.78, according to ODFW.
Starts and stops
While the Oregon commercial Dungeness season can open as early as Dec. 1, it is often beset by delays caused by high levels of domoic acid in crab — a dangerous biohazard associated with algal blooms – as well as undersized crab. There is also a meat criteria of 23 percent or 24 percent, depending on the region of the coast, that must be met before the season opens.
The start of the 2022-23 season was delayed until Jan. 15, 2023 and prices paid to fishermen started at $2.61 a pound, dropping in February to a near historic low of $2.13. That led to a significant portion of the Newport fleet tying off at the docks for nearly two weeks in an unofficial work stoppage in an effort to persuade processors to increase prices.
This season opened in segments to allow crab to gain weight. Acid was not an issue.
Crabbing from Cape Foulweather south to the California border opened Dec. 16; Foulweather north to Cape Falcon near Manzanita on Jan. 1; and Cape Falcon to the Washington border on Feb. 1. It has become commonplace for the crab in the northern section of the state, which includes the Columbia River area, to take the longest to reach market weight.
“The staggered opener absolutely helped fishermen,” Cherry said. “It allowed for volume to get onto the market, volume to disappear and price to increase. And then with the next opener we’d watch a fall in price but it stabilized pretty quickly after that. Each opener basically got paid a little bit more than the previous opener.”
Cherry launched one of his two boats during Garibaldi’s January opener and his second with the February start to the north. In what is called a “30-day fair start”, a vessel that participates in one opening has to wait 30 days before it can move to an area with a later start date.
Cherry said he is “absolutely happy” with the 30-day fair start because it levels the playing field for smaller operators.
“Fair start is there to protect the vessels that participate in the industry, basically from weather events and from larger vessels coming through and cleaning up and then leaving those areas,” he said. “Basically, making sure the large boats that go out and fish through any weather 24/7 don’t just go through and get the cream off all the openers and then leave.”
Discussion over criteria
Fair start was one of the issues discussed at last week’s meeting of the Oregon Dungeness Crab Advisory Committee hosted by ODFW. The committee is comprised in part of fishermen, processors and other purchasers as well as industry marketing groups. While fair start did not induce much of a discussion, whether to move the lines that divide areas of the coast based on meat percentage testing did.
Options discussed centered around moving particular lines north or south based on meeting the 23 percent meat criteria north of Cascade Head or the 24 percent set south of Cascade Head, or eliminating lines altogether and shifting to 24 percent coastwide, or leaving lines as they are.
The area between Cape Foulweather, which is just south of Depoe Bay, to Cape Lookout north of Pacific City often straddles the percentage fence so a figure of 23.5 percent was also on the table. The discussion concluded with support going in many different directions, which led ODFW officials to say they have a lot to think about.
At one point in the meeting, fishermen asked Newport Pacific Seafood manager John Moody what he thought would be best. Pacific Seafood is one of the biggest processors on the West Coast.
“I would like to see 24 (percent south of Cascade Head) at a minimum and 24 at Falcon south as well,” Moody said. “The feedback I get from the markets is the Newport crab is more favorable than the river crab with the lower threshold …”
Moody said he understands the ports and the lines but felt the focus should be on the quality. And with a “thousand variables,” Moody said he would like to see the higher percentage from Foulweather to Cape Lookout, which would encompass Cascade Head.
Cherry, who is also a member of the committee, said last week that changing to 24 percent in the north would mean longer delays to the season’s start.
“My idea of it is leave it where it’s at so that it allows for the access for the earlier openers,” Cherry told YachatsNews. “And my whole idea on this is when the crab is ready – whether it’s 23 percent above Cascade (Head) or 24 percent below, open those areas.”
- Garret Jaros is YachatsNews’ full-time reporter and can be reached at GJaros@YachatsNews.com
Thank you for the accurate and detailed reporting, Garret. There is plenty of politics within this fishery, and with its coastwide economic impact and cultural importance, it is nice seeing detailed reporting of a multitude of relevant issues, instead of just ‘season opens’ stories of yesteryear. You and YachatsNews do a great job.