the European green crab are an invasive species originally from Europe
They've been here since the 1800s. They're an incredibly hardy species. They are
almost impossible to kill, They reproduce at an incredible rate.
And with a lack of natural predators, they have really changed our ecosystems in our estuaries.
They like to prey upon shellfish, they really have done a number on the softshell clam industry,
which I believe is historically speaking Maine's second largest fishery, and the the landings have
really plummeted. They feed on oysters, mussels, all sorts of stuff. I've been into different
estuaries here and there and gone with folks who like to go pick mussels, and they'd go to the
spots where they went as kids, and flipping over seaweed and you just hear the crabs everywhere.
And so even some students were like, "well here's a remarkably abundant resource,
is it useful? Can we use it for anything?"
I'm Mike Masi, I am a former teacher of marine science at York high school
and I've been interested in fishing green crab for a number of years now,
since meeting up with Gabby Bradt through through some school projects.
I'm Gabby Bradt, I am the fisheries extension specialist for New Hampshire Sea Grant and UNH
Cooperative Extension, and I do a lot of work with our commercial fishermen and seafood marketing
and creating markets for green crabs and seaweed, and I also do a lot of work with marine debris.
So mike and I actually met up because I had started my citizen science monitoring program
with schools and he had seen the New Hampshire Green Crab Project website. He reached out to
me and he said, "hey, I'm kind of interested in this, could you come and talk about it?"
So I got into harvesting green crab through a school project that was funded
by the York Sustainable Fisheries Fund. So I was able to get 20 green crab traps
and we monitored that population for three years. We'd do a harvest
at the same time a year, it was a great project to get the school year started.
Gabby has been involved for a number of years now.
She's come into the classroom, which has been fantastic, you know, just to
show the kids what what real scientists do and how they try to tackle problems.
And we just kept talking and he kept inviting me over you know to keep in touch with the students
and and so on and so forth and then even in the summer, without his students there, he's like so
what do you think? And he was always, always interested.
She did the hard work. As a resource for us she's been instrumental. She's been
great. To do the scientific work, that takes a little bit more time you know.
We're just kind of cherry-picking from her
knowledge and just trying to take that next step to go commercial.
He basically saw what I saw. He's like, "why are people not, you know, tapping this resource?
It seems silly not to tap this resource?" And he was willing to put in the time and effort.
So much of this is surrounded by Rachel Carson
Wildlife Refuge. Yeah this area is pretty well protected from development.
Not protected from green crab, as you'll see in a second. It's just loaded with green crab.
It was, it's just kind of a natural progression. It's like, how can you not?
If I'm harvesting you know 400 pounds of these crab how could I not take a peek on the underside,
say oh that one's going to molt. You know it's just general curiosity, can we get these to molt?
You really need the crabs to molt for a lucrative fishery because
green crab have a very hard shell with very little meat. So the picking market which you
have with lobsters or larger crab is just not there. You know you could crack open a blue crab
or snow crab or any larger crab and you'll have a good amount of meat coming from that.
It's just too painstaking, too laborious to try to do that with a green crab.
And so what you have to do, is you have to get them right after they molt, and pull them out
of the water when they're really soft, and that will stop them stop their shells from hardening
And then you can consume the entire crab shell and all.
And you do that typically by deep frying them and it's exactly the same way that they do blue
crab soft shell blue crab down in the Chesapeake area, which is a very very lucrative business.
Here is what we've got for the mulch
of the past three days. So I think, you know, these are the softies right here,
and you can feel how this one, and just the behavior of this one is much more lethargic.
It is completely and totally alive, it's doing just fine, it's been in the refrigerator for
a day maybe two, and go ahead and give a touch. This is extremely soft, and you won't,
you know, compress the shell. It has no rigidity to it whatsoever,
it just kind of feels like leather. So this will fry up really really well.
Most of these, if I got them within that within
the day or you know the 12 hours that they molted, these are completely and totally
soft. And these ones are a great product right here. This is what they'll look and feel like.
One of my dreams for this this whole green crab project and trying to get all of the science down
for when they molt, how they molt, could we even get it into restaurants,
was this very circular you know tech transfer type of thing where as an extension and Sea
Grant person, I get to do the research, I get to talk to people, and then show them how to do it.
And then have them take it over and actually, you know,
I show them the end line, and I was like now I show you how to get there and you get there.
And that's what I love about this project with mike is that it was exactly like that.
We molted out maybe maybe 100 crab this past spring and you know maybe another 10 so far on
this female molt that we're having this Fall. I gave about 60 of those away to the York River
Landing just to let them play around with them. They bought an additional 30 off of me and then we
also gave away maybe another 20 or so to the folks at Row 34. The feedback we got was fantastic. I
got to try my first one, we were, I was very nervous, like I really hope this product is
as good as they say, and thankfully it really was. And the chefs were blown away, they thought it was
as good if not better than blue crab. So that's really really encouraging. You know next year,
both my business partner and I are, we're ready to to commit to it. And it is going to be a grind,
the fishing's really easy, the sorting will be a couple days, but then you gotta,
you gotta check those traps or those condos and inside your crates twice a day.
So if we can scale up to 30 or 100 crates then I think there
is there is the money there. There's certainly no shortage of green crab.
So I'm that person who finds a challenge and I will work until I figure it out.
I saw it from idea to fruition and actual applicability, which you know for any scientist,
I think any work that you do, any research that you do doesn't just end at a publication. It's
actually being used for something, and um you know for me it isn't, it isn't mine, it's -- my whole
goal was to figure out the puzzle and then to, you know, give it to the people who could actually
run with it. So now, seeing all of this and at least having several people and then Mike
who is like full circle to me is um sort of what my job is all about.
And it's one of my you know really proudest accomplishments,
which is funny because I don't like crabs!
We are looking to get an oyster lease, on that oyster lease we've got it in
our application that we're going to use part of that lease to house green crab,
and to have our shedding facility. There's no doubt that even next year
we'd like to have a crack at commercial harvest of of soft shell green crab.
It's the type of fishery that currently you don't have to have like a fishing legacy to get into.
Lobstering is not easy to get into. And that's good, that protects
that heritage in Maine, but right now we've got too much of our eggs in that basket
of lobsters. If lobsters move on, which with the warming Gulf of Maine, it's possible.
Don't know how long, but right now the resource is good I think it's wise for folks to diversify,
to know what other options are out there. And it'll take some work, and it'll take some time,
but I think this, this is a viable option. And it's a great thing for folks who are.
like I said. not from fishing families. If they want to make a living out on the water then you
know this is something they could get into and it's got a really low cost of entry. Okay, you,
a skiff would be beneficial, but you could haul traps from shore. So, and you don't need a whole
bunch of traps, you just fish it every day, a few traps would do because the resource is just so
abundant. So you need a few traps, you need a few lobster crates, you know build out your own gear,
you're up and rolling for a very small amount of money. It's ten dollars to get
a harvester's license for green crab. There could be harvesters like this I think in every estuary.
But we are most definitely going to give it a full shot next season
at commercial landings of softshell crab.
I love it, I've loved working with Mike. I really like that he's taken
our information and put it to work. And I really, I can't wait to see where he goes
with it next year, and I can't wait to say "hey go eat your green crabs at, you know, York Landing."
We've got the buyers, the crab are abundant, we'll have our winter of making out the gear,
and kind of tweaking the gear here and then we'll be ready to roll.