Many Vital Details Still Are Unknown
About Kodiak’s King Crab Fishery
By Karl Armstrong
Kodiak and all of it’s people
have a vital interest at stake in
the king crab fishery, which now
is the dominant industry of this
island, having replaced all the
other fisheries in economic value.
Pioneer residents of this island
have seen, over the years, the bud
ding, blooming and wilt of other
fisheries, notably the salmon and
herring industries. While there
still remains an element of con
troversy as to the cause of the de
cline of other fisheries that once
gave employment to thousands of
people on these islands, it gen
erally can be said that poor man
agement and lack of wise conser
vation methods (in short, over
exploitation) caused the declines.
In order to intelligently manage
the king crab fishery, it goes
without saying that the various
aspects of the industry and of the
creature itself must be determined
and evaluated. Only from such
basic knowledge can a wise and
prudent management of the fish
ery be effected. It is the task of
the ADFG and its biologists to
obtain the material, data, and
knowledge necessary. Much is not
known about the king crab. The
unknowns vital to management
are outlined by the Special King
Crab Report of the ADFG dated
April 1, 1961 we present herein
to provide an indication of the
magnitude of the task facing the
ADFG:
“To date almost the entire Ko
diak fishery is based on migrating
king crabs. Only in a very few
areas can it reasonably be as
sumed that the fishery is on 10
I"- -
cal stocks or “bay crab,” and even
then for short periods of time.
The crab industry at its present
status is maintained by and large
on populations whose spacial lim
its are unknown and whose move
ments during the time they are
not in the fishery are a mystery.
Management has been forced to
draw conclusions on crab move
ments almost completely from ob
servations of the fishery. There
is good evidence that our migrant
stocks come from offshore areas
into the fishery, but as yet these
areas have not been delineated.
Before studies can be carried out
that will give us answers on other
aspects of the fishery, we must
know the offshore geographical
boundaries of the large bodies of
migrating crabs.
‘“The history of the crab fishery
in Kodiak so far is repetitious of
the history of every fishery man
kind has pursued. No indication
of population size or harvest rate
has been noted until catches start
to dwindle.
“An alternative to this approach
is to carry out a comprehensive
program of population enumera
tion before harvest exceeds re
cruitment. This can be done by
extensive tagging and sampling.
From enumeration, information
on recruitment and mortality
rates can be gleaned that will en
able management to tailor the
fishery to the production of the
populations.
“We don’t know if the minimum
size limit is correct, or if another
season of weight gain will exceed
mortality loss, thereby increasing
production.
“We don’t know whether ma
ture sub-legal male crabs are on
the breeding grounds concurrent
(at the same time) with the fe
males, so that the king crab can
be managed in the same manner
as Dungeness, where 90 percent
of the legal males are harvested
each year.
“At this writing we have yet
to develop research to the point
where regular sampling of larvae
and small crab can be cai'ried on
in order to ascertain each year’s
spawning success, therefore ena
bling us to forecast production.
“We do not have a backlog of
data such as we enjoy in salmon,
halibut, and other fisheries. Every
move we make now is experiment
al, by necessity cautious and, we
hope, conservative.
“There remains much to be
uncovered about king crabs, es
pecially when the populations are
subjected to fishing pressure. Life
history studies are far from com
plete, growth rates, natural mor
tality rates, fishing mortality and
many other aspects should be in
vestigated to have adequate man
agement to insure optimum sus
tained yield. The investigative
techniques are well known and to
accomplish the desired projects
remains a matter of adequate
funds and personnel.”
Griffin Memorial
Births
A daughter, Cynthia Lee, weigh
ing 7 lbs. 3 ozs., was born on April
27th to Louise and Harold Hatton.
A son, Max Allen, weighing 6
lbs. 8 ozs., was born on May 1 to
Ladella and Charles McLinn.
A son, Robert Dale, weighing 9
lbs. 5 ozs., was born on May 2 to
Sophia and Fred Katelnikoff.
Providing Fresh King Crab To Local
Folks Brings Success To Ray Martin Jr.
By most all standards and fig
ures available, Kodiak’s economy
appears to be the healthiest and
most vigorous of any in the entire
state of Alaska. And few are the
people who would argue with the
theory that this fact is attribut
able to the King Crab.
Without mentioning the several
canneries, whose year-round pay
rolls obviously are directly related
to the King Crab, it might be said
that most businesses of the area
would experience a bit of trouble
proving that their state of econ
omic health is based largely upon
the King Crab. While it undoubt
edly is quite true, it would take
some economic surveying to prove
such a statement.
Martin’s Fresh King Crab, one
of the “goingest” one-man busi
nesses in the area, has no such
trouble.. .King Crab itself, like
with the canneries, is his product.
Oddly enough, in light of the
fact that “Kodiak is the King Crab
Capitol of the World,” local resi
dents were hard put to obtain this
delicacy in its fresh state for their
tables for a number of years. Un
less one had a crab fisherman
friend who was thoughtful enough
to bring a crab, or worked in one
of the canneries, one had to be
satisfied with buying this delect
able sea food item in it’s canned
state...at the local markets.
Enterprising young Ray Mar
tin Jr. noted this fact and created
Martin’s Fresh King Crab to fill
the need. It has made him a
successful independent small bus
inessman here.
Though still in a modest stage
of development, Martin s r resti
King Crab is proving to be a fin
ancial success, and perhaps more
importantly, is constantly exper
iencing expanding sales.
Started only a few short months
ago in January, Martin’s Fresh
King Crab wasn’t all peaches and
cream in the beginning.
“I hoped hard for sales of 25
crab a day when I first started
in,” said Martin, whose successful
promotion efforts and business
acumen has since pushed sales to
over 300 crabs a week and present
ly is anticipating standing con
tracts for large shipments to the
mainland and states.
“I now send King Crabs as far
as New York and Honolulu and
haven’t had a bad shipment yet!”
he said enthusiastically.
Orders from Los Angeles, Port
land and Seattle are now com
monplace for Martin’s Fresh King
Crab, and* at the very time of this
interview he was experiencing a
slight difficulty in getting enough
crabs to fill the day’s orders.
Martin’s Fresh King Crab, which
sell for fifty cents a pound whole,
or fifty-five cents for legs, also
expects to be handling Dungeness
crab and butterclams an “maybe”
shrimp in the immediate future.
Young 26-year old Ray, whose
father of the same name is the
well known PNA agent here, at
tended Burank High School and
graduated in 1960 with a B.A. de
cree in Transportation from the
University of Southern California
where he played football and was
on the rowing crew. He has al
tContinued On Page 19)
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