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Snow crab

There will be plenty of opilio through 2002, but it could be awhile before supplies reach the levels of the ‘70s

After king crab stocks collapsed in the early 1980s, the joke on the Seattle waterfront was that banks in Ballard would give you the choice of a toaster or a crab boat if you opened a new account.

Twenty years later, Alaska crabbers have once again fallen on hard times. And this time around, the culprit is snow crab. Just like catches of red king crab, which fell from 60,000 metric tons to zero between 1980 and 1983, catches of snow crab have fallen off a cliff, plummeting from almost 100,000 metric tons in 1999 to just 15,000 metric tons the past two years. The Alaska crab industry, it seems, is a mere shell of its former self.

But even though crabbers are scurrying to Washington, D.C., asking for a federal buyout, don’t write the Alaska crab industry off just yet. The snow crabs may be coming back.

In Alaska, crab has always been where the money is. Even after the king crab collapse, the crab industry first survived — and then prospered — by fishing snow crab, a species crabbers didn’t even bother to fish until the 1970s. 

After the United States decided that it owned anything crawling on its continental shelf, Japanese boats, which had been fishing for snow crab in the Bering Sea since the 1950s, were asked to pack up their tangle nets and sail home.

With the Japanese out of the picture, Alaska king crab boats jumped on the largest of the four Chionoecetes species found in the North Pacific, C. bairdi, which average between 2 and 4 pounds. By 1975, Alaska crabbers were landing almost 20,000 metric tons of bairdi a year, and processors exported brine-frozen clusters to a hungry Japanese market.

The late 1970s were the heyday of the Alaska crab fishery, when crewmembers would return to Seattle with $100,000 or more, and multimillion-dollar crab boats could be paid off after a season or two.

As more boats poured into the fishery, crabbers started targeting the smaller C. opilio. Huge stocks of opilio, which are about half the size of the bigger bairdi, extended across the Bering Sea from Alaska to Russia’s Kamchatka Peninsula.

Alaska crabbers were landing almost 100,000 metric tons of crab a year by 1978, about a quarter of which were opilio. While some opilio was exported to Japan, most of it headed down to the Lower 48, where it became the featured item on all-you-can-eat seafood buffets.

When king crab collapsed, so did bairdi, and since the mid-1980s the Alaska crab industry has been largely dependent on the fortunes of the opilio fishery. By 1985, opies accounted for almost 75 percent of the Alaska crab harvest, which by that year had declined to less than 40,000 metric tons.

Although biologists aren’t exactly sure why (they think it had something to do with water temperatures), the population of snow crab started to explode in the Bering Sea in the 1980s. By the time these crabs reached a harvestable size at about 8 or 9 years old, catches soared, hitting a record of almost 150,000 metric tons in 1991.

With the exception of 1995 and 1996, when catches were just 30,000 metric tons, Alaska’s opilio fishery consistently produced catches of 75,000 metric tons or more until the bottom dropped out of the fishery in 2000.

But the Bering Sea isn’t the only place C. opilio is found. The same species is also found in the western North Atlantic from the Davis Strait off Greenland to the northern coast of Nova Scotia. So the sudden collapse of Alaska’s snow crab fishery has been good news for fishermen in Atlantic Canada, where snow crab saved a cod-starved industry’s bacon.

Since 1990, the export value of Canada’s snow crab fishery has soared from just $99 million (Canadian) to a whopping $720 million (Canadian) in 2000, making it Canada’s second-most-valuable fishery, just slightly less lucrative than lobster. Over the same period, catches have almost quadrupled, from just 26,000 metric tons in 1990 to more than 90,000 metric tons.

Although Canadians have been fishing snow crab since the mid-1960s, the fishery didn’t really start to amount to anything until the mid-1980s, when processors in New Brunswick developed a market in Japan for a premium snow crab pack.

The reason the New Brunswick processors were able to get a leg up on the Alaskans has to do with the management style of their snow crab fishery.

Compared to Alaska, fishing for snow crab in the Gulf of St. Lawrence is a relatively relaxed affair. In Alaska, fishermen race each other across the storm-tossed, icy Bering Sea when the fishery opens each January in an effort to catch as much as they can of a shared quota. If the quota is a decent size, the fishery may last for three or four months.

The past few years, though, the fishery has lasted only about a week. The breakneck pace of the Alaska fishery requires processors to process crab as fast as they can, so they can keep up with the boats.

But in the Gulf of St. Lawrence, the fishery opens each spring, and a few hundred fishermen are assigned individual quotas, which they can fish, and processors can process, at a sane pace until the crabs begin to molt and the fishery closes in August.

The controlled nature of Canada’s gulf fishery allows processors to put up a higher-quality snow crab pack. Sections with missing legs, for example, can be routed to a meat line. This is not possible in the frenzied Alaska fishery, which can produce only sections. The use of cryogenic freezing, though costly, has been justified as long as the Japanese pay an extra $1 a pound or more.

The main market for this premium snow crab, the resorts and inns of northeastern Japan, has been willing to pay until the past few years. However, the growing availability of fresh Russian snow crab, which is landed alive in Japan and cooked by small processors, has seriously disrupted the market for premium Canadian snow crab. As a result, processors in New Brunswick have installed brine freezers to produce snow crab for the United States.

Snow crab has also been fished off Newfoundland, although the fishery was relatively minor until the 1990s, when the collapse of the Northern cod stocks gave fishermen a reason to gear up for crab. As interest in the fishery grew, the province’s snow crab landings rose steadily, from 11,000 metric tons in 1990 to a record 69,000 metric tons in 1999.

The Newfoundland snow crab fishery has been more chaotic than that in the gulf, since the province granted snow crab quotas to thousands of displaced inshore cod fishermen. And in an attempt to keep as many processing jobs as possible in the outports, Newfoundland officials required that most of the crab be picked for meat until the mid-1990s.

Because Newfoundland’s fishery comprises many small boats without tanks to hold live crab, its snow crab has been considered inferior to product from Alaska or the Gulf of St. Lawrence.

Also, since it was a new fishery, Newfoundland boats landed a high percentage of older crabs that were no longer molting and thus had darker, dirtier shells. Still, the crab was good enough to export, especially to the United States, a market the Canadians knew was not particularly picky when it came to quality.

Over the years, though, the quality of Newfoundland crab has improved, especially in the past few years. Following the collapse of the Alaska snow crab fishery, the Japanese buyers turned to Newfoundland as a replacement, forcing the province’s industry to produce a higher-quality product.

Supply outlook

The good news is that the worst appears to be over for the Alaska snow crab fishery. Although there were real fears there would be no opilio fishery in 2002, Alaska biologists announced in September that next year’s snow crab quota would be 13,600 metric tons, which is almost exactly the amount of crab landed in this year’s short fishery.

After next year, although biologists are cautious, things should start to pick up dramatically, as there are some very strong year classes coming into the fishery. Although catches probably won’t be back up to the 75,000-ton level overnight, they could get there within four years.

While Alaska snow crab catches gradually increase, demand from the Japanese market is expected to be relatively dull due to a weak economy and Japan’s ability to source snow crab from both Canada and Russia. As a result, more snow crab from Alaska should end up in the U.S. market.

Canadian snow crab harvests in 2001 are expected to be very close to last year’s levels of 93,000 metric tons, due to an extraordinarily strong catch in the Gulf of St. Lawrence for the second year in a row. This year’s catch in Newfoundland was approximately 55,000 metric tons, while fishermen in the Gulf of St. Lawrence caught close to 40,000 metric tons.

In the long term, look for Canadian snow crab catches to start to decline at the same time Alaska catches increase. Canadian biologists point out that landings in the Gulf are typically in the 15,000- to 25,000 metric-ton level, about half that of the past two years. Catches in Newfoundland have already declined from a record 69,000 metric tons in 1999 and could well decline further next year.

As landings have increased, more Canadian snow crab has been exported to the United States, which has partially offset the steep decline in Alaska supply. Between 1998 and 2000, for example, U.S. imports of Canadian snow crab sections jumped from about 19,000 metric tons to almost 30,000 metric tons. Over the same period, annual U.S. imports of Canadian snow-crab meat have remained steady at between 3,000 and 4,000 metric tons.

So far this year, U.S. imports of Canadian snow crab have increased even more sharply, due to the weak Japanese market. Over the first six months of 2001, U.S. imports of Canadian snow crab sections were approximately 18,000 metric tons, up more than 60 percent from the same period last year.

A lot more snow crab from Greenland is also showing up in the U.S. market. Although Greenland’s snow crab harvest is still relatively small at less than 10,000 metric tons, it has become the country’s third most important seafood export, after shrimp and Greenland halibut.

As long as snow crab prices remain at their current relatively high levels, look for more Greenland fishermen to exploit what could prove to be a very large, relatively untapped snow crab resource. In the first six months of 2001, U.S. imports of snow crab from Greenland were up from just 250 metric tons in 2000 to more than 1,500 metric tons this year.

In summary, there will be plenty of snow crab, although it could be three or four years until supplies reach their lofty levels last seen before Alaska’s latest crab crash. 

Meanwhile, as far as bairdi goes, forget it. Bering Sea stocks remain at extremely low levels and the fishery will be closed for the fifth straight year. A small fishery in the Southeast, though, should continue to produce about 1,000 metric tons of bairdi a year. 

Price trends

The large influx of Canadian sections earlier this year resulted in a substantial decline in snow crab prices throughout 2001.

Since 5- to 8-ounce Newfoundland sections hit a high of $4.50 a pound in February 2000, it’s been pretty much downhill ever since. So far this year, the average price of 5/8 Newfoundland sections has fallen from $4 in January to a low of $3.25 a pound in August.

The lower snow crab prices this year have resulted in pretty healthy sales. In spite of the increase in Canadian imports, U.S. cold storage holdings at the end of July were 20 percent below last year, one reason snow crab prices kicked up a dime in September.

Prices to distributors for this year’s Canadian combo snow-crab-meat blocks have also declined, from a high of $8.50 a pound in April to $7.75 a pound early this fall, f.o.b. Boston.

Shortly after the delayed 2001 Alaska Bering Sea snow crab fishery closed the second week of February (normally the fishery opens in mid-January, but a strike kept most crabbers tied up for almost three weeks), Alaska processors were getting $4.75 a pound for 5- to 8-ounce sections. However, once it became apparent that Japanese demand was nil due to a slow economy and a weakening yen, prices started to fall. By this summer, Alaska processors were selling high-quality 8-ups to distributors for just over $4 a pound.

This September, Alaska crab processors were expecting a replay of last year’s fishery, although it should be back to its normal January opening unless crabbers strike. But if the economic outlook and consumer spending slow down noticeably in the last quarter, look for Alaska processors to offer fishermen a lower price than the $1.55 a pound they received last year. If that turns out to be the case, look for new-production Alaska sections to start the season at $4 a pound or lower.

Although inventories in September were running below last year’s, if consumption slows through the last quarter, prices of this year’s Canadian sections could head back down, although they will likely remain above $3 a pound. What happens to prices of Canadian snow crab next spring will depend primarily on the state of the U.S. economy. Given all the uncertainty following the terrorist attacks in September, buyers can expect prices to be below last year’s levels. 

Buying tips

The quality and price of snow crab varies quite a bit from processor to processor, so buyers need to pay attention to who packed their crab, and when and to where it was shipped.

The best snow crab is cryogenically frozen using carbon dioxide in April and May by processors along the shore of the Gulf of St. Lawrence. This crab is a better buy than it used to be, as a lot of Japanese buyers have switched to fresh Russian crab. Still, expect to pay a premium of about 50 cents to $1 a pound. 

Almost all other snow crab, though, is brine frozen. Alaska snow crab is considered a premium product, although the quality still varies from packer to packer. If you’re getting crab from a catcher/processor, pay close attention, as some boats will run short on fresh water, and their crab can be more salty as they race to process their catch during the short fishery.

The catcher/processors that process the snow crab quotas that are given to native Alaska villages can produce an excellent product, as they can take as much time as they want to catch the assigned quota.

Product from Newfoundland is generally priced at about 50 cents a pound less than the same-sized Alaska product. Nevertheless, if you find the right Newfoundland packer, the quality can be comparable and hence a better value.

Most snow crab is packed to meet the standard Japanese No. 1 spec that allows one leg to be missing (not including the trailer leg) from a section. A good No. 1 pack will have hardly any broken legs, and even the worst No. 1 pack should have no more than 20 percent of the sections with a missing leg.

A lot of packers will use the term “soldier pack” in an attempt to position their product as a premium pack, but the term is so misused, says one packer, “it’s pathetic.” Most product is packed net weight with a 7 to 12 percent glaze.

Culinary notes

Snow crab can be an incredibly good, or incredibly disappointing, culinary experience.

If you want a really great seafood special, try putting some fresh bairdi snow crab from Southeast Alaska on your menu. It’s a small fishery that lasts only about a week each February, but once you’ve tried this crab, you’ll know how good snow crab can be.

At the lower end of the snow crab spectrum are the small, dried-out broken sections featured in inexpensive all-you-can-eat buffets (what did you expect for $4.99?).

In between, there’s a grade of snow crab that can be used for almost any culinary application. 

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