Eyes on the Elwha: A Conversation with WSG Coastal Hazards Specialist, Ian Miller

March 3, 2025

By Maddie Gard, WSG Science Communications Fellow

When the Elwha River dams were breached in 2011, a century’s worth of accumulated sediment was released and transported downstream to the coastal zone. An estimated 19 million metric tons of mud, sand and gravel that had been trapped in the dam reservoirs transformed twists and turns of the Elwha River, eventually flushing out to the coast and reshaping the river delta near Port Angeles. Since then, Washington ...

3
MAR

0

Hazard Resilience, Marine and Coastal Planning, WSG News Blog

Crab Team Turns 10: Crabstock Shell-ebration

February 26, 2025

Crab Team Origins & 10 Years of Accomplishments

From humble beginnings spent daydreaming in 2014, from the first trap in the water in 2015, to a network of 307 active monitors across 68 sites: in 2024, Crab Team celebrated a decade of trudging around in the mud and counting crabs! A ...

26
FEB

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Green Crab Monitoring

2024 Green Crab Status Summary: Part 2 (Coastal Estuaries)

February 13, 2025

In this post, we’ll continue our reflections back on 2024 through the lens of the status and trends of European green crabs in Washington. In the last post, we shared observations from trapping efforts across Salish Sea shorelines. Here we shift to shorelines on Washington’s Pacific coast.

The Coast in Context

As of writing this post, the total number of individual green crabs removed from Washington ...

13
FEB

0

Green Crab Monitoring

2024 Green Crab Status Summary: Part 1 (Inland)

January 6, 2025

It’s a season of new beginnings, and as we transition into the New Year, we continue to wrap up what 2024 meant in terms of the European green crab invasion in Washington. And as WSG Crab Team wraps up the 10th year of green crab monitoring, we also find ourselves reflecting on the last decade. In the next few blog posts, we aim to share some of these summaries and reflections. We will ...

6
JAN

0

Green Crab Monitoring

Protocol in Focus: Catches in Focus

December 16th, 2024

Tips for taking the best photos of your bin catches

Your bin photos may feel as easy as the click of a button, but they are the essential step in the protocol that allows the Crab Team dataset to be used by researchers. Namely, they are the tool for validating all your findings in our data QC process. As data submitters know, Crab Team staff (Emily!) cross checks every single trapping sheet and photo from ...

16
DEC

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Green Crab Monitoring

Local marinas help to keep Washington’s waters clean

July 1, 2024

Thirteen Washington marinas have recertified under the state’s Clean Marina program so far in 2024.

To become a certified Clean Marina, a marina must meet a set of minimum pollution prevention requirements, identify sustainability goals and activities, and create a plan to achieve them over a three-year period. For example, a ...

1
JUL

0

Boating, WSG News Blog

Protocol in Focus: Why do we measure native crabs, too?

June 18, 2024

Why Measure Native Species?

When it comes to interactions between crabs, whether of the same species or of differing species, size matters. When crabs run into each other out on tide flats, in lagoons, or channels, they might compete for food or shelter, or they may actually try to prey on each other. In these encounters, the general rule of #CrabLife is that bigger crabs win over smaller crabs. So knowing the size of not only green ...

17
JUN

0

Green Crab Monitoring

Crab Team Welcomes Zach Bengtsson as Student Assistant

May 23, 2024

This winter, WSG Crab Team was joined by a second graduate student assistant, Zach Bengtsson. Zach is currently pursuing his Ph.D. at UW’s School of Aquatic and Fishery Sciences researching stress responses of marine invertebrates. We asked Zach to share some of his story with us to introduce himself to the broader Crab Team community.

What brought you to Crab Team? What interested you in the position?

My current graduate work ...

23
MAY

0

Green Crab Monitoring

2023 Green Crab Status Summary: Part 2 (Coast)

May 7, 2024

Continuing our summary of 2023 green crab status and trends

Pacific Coast

The momentum and dedication to extensive trapping for European green crab on Washington’s Pacific coastline continued to grow through 2023. Over the course of the year, nearly 355,000 green crabs were removed from the coastal estuaries and shorelines. Let’s take a closer look at what the catch data showed about population status and trends.

Newer sites with high abundances

7
MAY

0

Green Crab Monitoring

2023 Green Crab Status Summary: Part 1 (Inland)

April 10, 2024

While 2023 already seems like an eon ago, last year’s trapping season is still very much on our minds even as we launch the 2024 monitoring effort. The winter is a time for green crab managers to regroup, review data to interpret green crab population patterns and think about strategies for the coming year. In December, WSG hosted our third annual Trapper’s Summit, a day-long workshop for trapping partners all over the state to come and ...

10
APR

0

Green Crab Monitoring

Protocol in Focus: Why do we measure European green crabs?

November 17, 2023

We are Crab Team after all, so it’s perhaps no surprise that we are not shy about getting up to our elbows in details about the crabs we catch. But what can we actually learn from looking at size data of crabs? What makes handling all the angry pinchers worthwhile?

We’re covering this rich topic in two issues of Protocol in Focus. This time, we’ll shed light on what we can ...

15
NOV

0

Green Crab Monitoring

Crab Team Welcomes Elyse Kelsey as Student Assistant

September 20, 2023

Hello WSG Crab Team Community!

My name is Elyse Kelsey and I am thrilled to be joining Crab Team as a Student Assistant. I just missed the field season this year but I am excited to meet and work alongside the incredible volunteers and partners that make this work possible next summer! For the next few months, I will be keeping busy by entering data, managing field gear, and offering administrative support from ...

25
SEP

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Green Crab Monitoring

2022 Season Wrap Up – WA Coast

June 15, 2023

As we dive into the 2023 European green crab trapping season, it’s important to reflect on the insights gained from the coastal green crab populations in 2022. This summary of green crab observations from Washington’s coastal estuaries complements our Inland 2022 wrap-up, rounding out our focus on the trends and patterns observed from green crab trapping results across the state. We pulled from several different data sources to piece together an ...

15
JUN

0

Green Crab Monitoring

Introducing Molt Search

May 1, 2023

WSG and WSU Extension have teamed up to launch a new volunteer-based early detection program to complement the existing Crab Team monitoring network—introducing, Molt Search.

Building on Early Detection Success

Molt search builds on the hard work of Crab Team monitors who have been conducting early detection surveys since 2015. The network has found some of the first generations ...

1
MAY

0

Green Crab Monitoring

A Code to Crab By

March 13, 2023

Crab Team has come a long way since a handful of intrepid early-adopter volunteers put their boots in the mud for our pilot season in August 2015. Since that time, the network has:

Increased from 7 to 67 sites,
Expanded beyond the Salish Sea to include coastal estuaries,
Grown from 35 to more than 300 partner and volunteer ...

13
MAR

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Green Crab Monitoring

Outreach

Crab Team Origins & 10 Years of Accomplishments

The Coast in Context

Tips for taking the best photos of your bin catches

Why Measure Native Species?

What brought you to Crab Team? What interested you in the position?

Pacific Coast

Newer sites with high abundances

Building on Early Detection Success