Arron Podey,

At the 2008 FWC, BCAB meeting I stated concern for harvest of female blue crabs.

This 2009 October BCAB meeting I’ll again express concern for harvesting female blue crabs.

Regulations state 5” minimum size limit, prohibits keeping of eggbearing blue crabs, and

requires 3 unobstructed escape rings. It’s necessary to include 3 different regulations all

dealing with taking of female and male small crabs to stress a point. Frankly, personal

experience indicates regulations need to go one more step and possibly more to optimize

protection of female blue crabs at different sages of development. Therefore, rule should also

state immature female blue crabs must be returned to the water free, alive, unharmed, and

illegal for sale. Immature female blue crabs are easily recognized having an inverted “V” or

triangle shaped apron. Good example happen today when a customer bought a bushel of blue

crabs from me and stated someone was selling bushels of blue crabs at a road side stand in

Bradenton and bushel baskets contained only small blue crabs. This resulted from crabber

selling his 5” blue crabs to a market and selling his smaller crabs by the bushel to whom ever.

Since FWC Marine Officers are understaffed it only makes sense to add additional rules to

stress the point; female blue need protection at all stages of life. Actually, rule would not

negatively impact crabbers except crabbers who sell small illegal blue crabs, because most

immature female blue crabs are less than 5” in size. Because blue crab catches have been low

due to drought, I'm guessing a lot of undersize blue crabs are sold just to meet expenses...and

besides no one monitors!

Do we care about female blue reproduction, or wait until we experience a condition like

Chesapeake Bay? 

      http://www.bluecrab.info/identification.html

"Sally"

A immature (adolescent) female blue crab, known as a "Sally" or "She-Crab" to watermen, is

easily identified as having an inverted "V" or triangular shaped apron and red-tipped claws. Her

apron is tightly sealed to her body and does not open since she cannot mate or carry eggs.

Luiz

12/22/08 

Luiz,

Thank you for copy of 2007 Fisheries-Independent Monitoring Program and I received copy of  

http://www.gsmfc.org/publications/GSMFC Number 096.pdf, published 2001.

Maybe, I better understand juvenile blue crab numbers for Tampa Bay, but I still

have concerns with declining resource. The Ernie Estevez 2003 report indicated LMR Trap #

662 with highest trap density 41.4 #/km for regional rivers.

Between area drought and Tampa Bay areas dependency on surface water and ground water,

brackish water feeding Tampa Bay has almost disappeared. Resulting all Tampa Bay blue crabs

juveniles and adults moving up rivers in search of food. But, instead of natural food, all they find

are crab traps loaded with shad bait. This results in the over harvesting of blue crab resource.

If FWC - BCAB management has no desire to manage numbers of crabbers or crab traps for an

particular area, then the only solution is create no fishing zones for blue crabs.  

http://www.gsmfc.org/publications/GSMFC Number 096.pdf contains 5.2.2.1 Alabama

Dept.of Conservation and Natural Resource Regulations for blue crabs 5.2.2.7.4, Close Areas

and Season, creates a closed area for harvesting blue crabs north of I-10, and Mississippi

5.2.3.1 Department of Marine Resources for blue crabs 5.2.3.7.4, Closed Areas and Seasons,

creates closed areas North of I-10 in three counties, Jackson, Harrison, and Hancock, for

commercially harvesting blue crabs.

Personally, I find the State Of Florida in default for protection of its blue crab resource. Can

FWC show cause, or proof where FWC is protecting the blue crab resource from over-harvest

in the Little Manatee River? If not, then I'm proposing a no commercial blue crab harvest area

for Little Manatee River with (2) Options. One at 8 km point, and one at 12 km point I-75

bridge.

Thank you for your time and consideration.

http://crabbyadventures.com/blue_crab_sanctuary