Tough News from NOAA
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association (which happens to be located right around the corner from my apartment) has released a new report on the state of the Chesapeake Blue Crab. Sadly, the report shows that the crab population in the bay is still below the species’ long-term average, and has fallen since the 06-07 census.
Last year, the population was tallied at 143 million. This year, NOAA’s Fisheries Steering Committee only counted 120 million crabs. The scary part? Even last year’s numbers fell short of the interim target population of 200 million spawning crabs, meaning that conservationists will have a lot of work to do to to try and reach that number in the following years.
Read the report here: http://noaanews.noaa.gov/stories2008/20080728_bluecrab.html