Green Crab Sightings

2023 Green Crab Status Summary: Part 2 (Coast)
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

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7
MAY
0

Green Crab Monitoring

2023 Green Crab Status Summary: Part 1 (Inland)
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 ...

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10
APR
0

Green Crab Monitoring

Monitors Capture Their First in Green Crab in Chuckanut Bay
Monitors Capture Their First in Green Crab in Chuckanut Bay

August 9, 2022

Crab Team volunteer monitors have been working in Chuckanut Bay since 2017, and just last month they pulled up their first live green crab during monthly sampling. The crab was a larger (77mm) older female, indicating she’d been present at the site for at least three or four years.

In 2019, three green crabs were captured by Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife in assessment trapping. Since that time, no further live captures have been made, including in ...

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9
AUG
0

Green Crab Monitoring

In the Nick of time? An early detection and rapid assessment in Hood Canal
In the Nick of time? An early detection and rapid assessment in Hood Canal

June 8, 2022

The amazing volunteers who make up Washington Sea Grant’s Crab Team have done it again, detecting a basketful of green crabs before they became a truckload. Part of what makes this event particularly significant is that it’s in Hood Canal, a basin of the Salish Sea where green crabs had not previously been detected. 

From Detection to Response

During their regular monthly monitoring in May, the team at Nick’s Lagoon near Seabeck caught ...

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8
JUN
0

Green Crab Monitoring

Coastal Green Crab Captures Increased in 2021
Coastal Green Crab Captures Increased in 2021

January 20, 2022

Trapping throughout 2021 indicates that the European green crab invasion has grown across Washington’s coastal estuaries, namely Willapa Bay, Grays Harbor, and Makah Bay. This year’s collaborative efforts by many partners to remove crabs and track the invasion also confirmed that green crabs are more abundant and widespread in these locations than they are along inland shorelines, and will likely continue to increase.

A Collaborative Approach

2021 marked the second year of intensive and systematic trapping for European green ...

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20
JAN
0

Green Crab Monitoring

What Does the Invasion at Lummi Mean for the Salish Sea?
What Does the Invasion at Lummi Mean for the Salish Sea?

December 6, 2021

The recent report by the Lummi Nation of more than 70,000 European green crabs captured this year has many wondering what this could mean for efforts to prevent green crabs from establishing in the Salish Sea. This number certainly indicates that the population of green crabs within the sea pond on the Lummi Reservation has grown exponentially since their first detection in 2019 (Mueller and Jefferson, ...

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6
DEC
0

Green Crab Monitoring

Completing the First Year of a Collaborative Removal Effort at Drayton Harbor
Completing the First Year of a Collaborative Removal Effort at Drayton Harbor

December 23, 2020

One of the big successes this year was the launch of a local removal effort in Drayton Harbor. In spite of COVID, in spite of wildfire smoke, in spite of everything that 2020 had to throw at us, the collaborative management team was able to make great strides in trapping the Washington’s northernmost green crab hotspot. From May through October of this year, the crew was out trapping, trapping, and … trapping, with two ...

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23
DEC
0

Green Crab Monitoring

2020 Salish Sea Green Crab Update
2020 Salish Sea Green Crab Update

November 23, 2020

Trapping for European green crab has mostly concluded for the 2020 season, enabling us to take stock of all that was accomplished this year and provide some status updates on green crab. The obstacles this year were considerable, but volunteers and managers were more than equal to the task, masking, attesting, and distancing, not to mention riding out wildfire smoke, to trap for green crabs. The next few posts will provide updates on what was accomplished and what ...

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23
NOV
0

Green Crab Monitoring

Launching Collaborative Green Crab Management in Drayton Harbor (part 2)
Launching Collaborative Green Crab Management in Drayton Harbor (part 2)

July 3, 2020

Removal of European green crab in Drayton Harbor is now underway, thanks to the collaborative efforts of WSG, Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife (WDFW), the Northwest Straits Commission (NWSC) and other stakeholders. This is the second of two posts on efforts to date. Part 1 covered the development of the management team. 

Removal trapping of European green crabs at Drayton Harbor officially began on May 26. Since then, staff with Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife (WDFW) ...

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3
JUL
0

Green Crab Monitoring

A Slow Start to the 2020 Green Crab Season
A Slow Start to the 2020 Green Crab Season

May 8, 2020

Like so many other projects and programs right now, partners contributing to state-wide efforts to manage European green crabs are trying to figure out what can safely be done, in the midst of the global pandemic, to address the urgent threat of invasion. In particular, there has been concern that green crabs won’t wait until COVID-related isolation measures are lifted to continue their population growth and spread, and that we could miss a critical ...

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8
MAY
0

Green Crab Monitoring

Further Green Crab Captures in Whatcom County
Further Green Crab Captures in Whatcom County

October 22, 2019

Broadening the search for invasive European green crab in Drayton Harbor, Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife and WSG Crab Team captured additional European green crab in recent weeks. In addition, Lummi Natural Resources has reported capturing green crab in Lummi Bay as a result of early detection trapping, expanding the list of new sites where green crab have been confirmed in Whatcom County this year.

Drayton Harbor, Blaine

Following the discovery of several molted green ...

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24
OCT
0

Green Crab Monitoring

Invasive Green Crabs Found at Drayton Harbor
Invasive Green Crabs Found at Drayton Harbor

(Photo: A male, 38.5mm European green crab, one of the 17 captured at Drayton Harbor last month.)  

October 8, 2019

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Blaine, WA — As part of an early-detection partnership, the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife (WDFW) and the Washington Sea Grant (WSG) Crab Team found evidence of European green crabs (Carcinus maenas) in Drayton Harbor during regular monitoring, and then trapped 17 green crabs during a two-day rapid response in ...

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8
OCT
0

Green Crab Monitoring

European Green Crab Detection During San Juan Island Assessment
European Green Crab Detection During San Juan Island Assessment

September 6th, 2019

Last week, Crab Team Program Manager, Emily Grason, and Program Assistant, Kelly Martin, conducted a trapping assessment on San Juan Island with Chelsey Buffington and Roy Clark from the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife (WDFW). After three days and more than 330 trap sets, one male European green crab (64 mm) was found in Westcott Bay. 

Westcott Bay, on the northern end of San Juan Island, is the location of the very first ...

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6
SEP
0

Green Crab Monitoring

Detection of European Green Crab in Drayton Harbor
Detection of European Green Crab in Drayton Harbor

August 22, 2019

Crab Team volunteers in Drayton Harbor, just south of the border with Canada, found the shell of an invasive European green crab while walking the beach this past Saturday. The detection is the furthest northward along Washington shorelines the invasive species has been confirmed.

Margaret Santamaria and Margarette Grant are part of the Crab Team crew at a monitoring site on California Creek. They made the discovery while they were conducting a survey nearby for another citizen science project, ...

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22
AUG
0

Green Crab Monitoring

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