Crabbing Season Offers Fewer But Bigger Crabs

Three days into the crabbing season and some fishermen in the Brookings-Harbor area say things aren't going well.

Chuck Moulton, the dock manager at The Port of Brookings-Harbor, says just aren't many crab coming in this year.

Most Medford restaurants get their crab from the Central Oregon and Northern California coasts.

The owner of The Wharf, a seafood market and restaurant in medford, says he has two suppliers in the Brookings area and just picked up a shipment Tuesday.

He says even though he will get fewer crab this season, the quality is better.

"Unfortunately it's not a good season, one thing that's good is when theres less crab the crab are larger because theres a lot more food for them on the bottom of the ocean, all two pound crab or better," said Brent Kenyon, owner of The Wharf.

Kenyon says he is currently selling crab for about $5.99 a pound, but expects the price will rise to $8-a-pound over the next two months.

Moulton says fishermen had a record three years in a row for crabbing starting in 2004.

He says last year was down and this year will probably be worse.

The Crescent City Harbor Master says so far they're also having a crabbing season that is below average in Northern California.

They too said things didn't go well last year and could get worse this year.