Stone crab season is off to a slow start in Tampa Bay. Here’s why.

In the days leading up to Oct. 15, Amy Wirtz felt a sense of unease.Any other year, it would’ve been an auspicious date: opening day of Florida stone crab season, sure to elicit a good amount of excitement and, hopefully, a good amount of crabs.But two back-to-back hurricanes in the weeks prior had the market manager at Pelican Point Seafood in Tarpon Springs feeling anxious: Did Helene’s violent storm surge or Milton’s powerful winds wreak havoc on the local crab populations? Would there be any crabs? But also: Would there be any customers?“It was a very strange feeling,” Wirtz said. “Like, what kind of demand are we going to have? It’s really uncharted territory.”Just weeks after two hurricanes barreled through the region, stone crab season is officially underway. But in the crab-harvesting areas on the west coast of Florida, the months-long derby for the state’s most popular crustacean is off to a particularly slow start.Florida is home to 99% of all stone crab landings in the United States, the majority of which are plucked from the waters in Monroe County around the Florida Keys and in Collier County, from Everglades City to Naples. Stone crabs can be found across the Tampa Bay area at seafood markets and restaurants, and most of those are sourced from around Dunedin and Tarpon Springs up through the Homosassa and Crystal River areas.Many local spots stocked a much smaller-than-usual amount of the coveted claws on opening day, while some had no claws at all. Stone crabs are considered by many to be a luxury, with prices ranging anywhere from $25 to $75 per pound, depending on the size. Exact market prices are influenced by several factors, making it hard to predict before the season starts.The state’s stone crab season runs through May 1. Fishers were allowed to start putting traps out two weeks before the season’s opener, on Oct. 5. But because Milton was predicted to make landfall around Oct. 9, many decided to play it safe and wait, delaying their catch during the season’s prized first week.Add to that a cold front that kept smaller boats off the water for several days, heavy damages to local fish houses and restaurants, and an all-but-certain future hit to tourism, and it’s anyone’s guess how the season will play out.“It’s definitely a rough start, for a lot of people,” said Claire Crowley-McIntyre, a research scientist for the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission.Crowley-McIntyre, who oversees the department’s crustacean fisheries monitoring, said it’s too soon to tell how exactly the storms could affect the amount of crab landings in the area.During Hurricane Irma, which made landfall near Marco Island as a Category 4 hurricane in 2017, heavy winds and waves churned up sediment that drove crabs much further offshore. But hurricanes can sometimes push the crustaceans closer to shore. It’s too early to tell what effects Helene or Milton had in this regard, McIntyre said.It’s also hard to tell if the economic hardships caused by the storms will affect consumers’ interest in the claws — and the industry’s ability to thrive.“Every year is a roll of the dice, it’s always unpredictable,” said Holly Dudley, a director at the Florida Stone Crabbers Association. “We only have six months to make a 12-month paycheck, and now we’re already half a month behind.”Robust crab operations in places like Cortez, a small fishing village just south of Anna Maria Island, incurred damage from the recent hurricanes, including ruined docks, lost crabbing gear and waterlogged fish houses. For those working in the industry, flooded homes and damaged boats added additional hurdles.“When a storm comes, we pray for our houses, but we pray for our boats more,” Dudley said.At A.P. Bell Fish Co. in Cortez, there’s been a trifecta of setbacks, said president Karen Bell, including a ruined roof, roughly 20 damaged homes housing the company’s fishermen and employees, and a foot of water inside the company’s dockside restaurant, Star Fish Company.On a good day in previous years, Bell said, she’d see boats bring in anywhere from 500 to 1,000 pounds of claws per day. This year, opening day brought in 20 pounds, while day two netted 23. A few days later, two boats brought back 320 pounds, combined.“I haven’t even (sold any) wholesale yet because we haven’t gotten enough quantity,” Bell said.There’s also a concern that areas hit hard by the storms, including beach communities like Anna Maria Island and Pinellas County barrier islands, could struggle to regain tourism.This is top of mind both for restaurant owners who are relying on sales of the lucrative crustacean after a particularly slow summer, and those working in the crab industry, who are worried about a drop in demand for the seafood commodity.“It all goes back to supply and demand,” Bell said. “I’ve already noticed the difference in A.P. Bell sales — no one is on the island.”Florida stone crabs fuel a more than $43 million industry, making it one of the state’s most valuable commercial fisheries. But it’s also a vulnerable business, and one that’s been in steady decline since 2000.The crabs, once considered one of the more sustainable types of Florida seafood, have in recent years landed on the Monterey Bay Aquarium’s red — or “avoid” — list. The guide, which keeps scorecards on seafood sustainability, downgraded the crustacean, citing in part overfishing and harvesting practices that involve taking one or both claws off a crab and releasing it back into the water. Stone crabs can regenerate claws, but some studies have shown they’re more likely to die after both claws are removed. Illegal practices such as the harvesting of pregnant crabs have also contributed to the population’s decline.“If you crunch the numbers, it’s about a loss of a million pounds per year in claws,” said Philip Gravinese, an assistant professor of marine science at Eckerd College.Gravinese has been studying local stone crab populations for the past 15 years — in particular how climate change, rising water temperatures, changing ocean pH levels and Red Tide events can impact the animals.With strong hurricanes like Helene and Milton, there’s an increased danger that nutrient-rich river runoff could fuel algal blooms, spurring a Red Tide that could negatively effect the local stone crab population, Gravinese said. His research shows that crabs exposed to Red Tide can be more lethargic and prone to higher rates of death, especially when crab larvae are exposed to the toxins.But there’s potential good news for the fishery, too. A series of regulations issued in 2020 — which include a slightly curbed harvesting season, a size increase for harvested claws and a cull ring to help allow smaller crabs and bycatch to escape — could have prompted some improvement, McIntyre said.The past few seasons have seen consistent numbers — around 2.1 to 2.2 million pounds of crabs harvested each year — but they’re still below the pre-2000 years, when the industry’s peak reached roughly 3.5 million pounds.“The crabs are out there,” Crowley-McIntyre said. “We’ve seen some pretty decent numbers down in the Keys, where those traps weren’t affected. This is the most consistent stone crab landings have been, but (the hurricane) is going to put another variable in place.”As part of her studies, Crowley-McIntyre and her team place research traps to help gauge the amount of crabs expected in a given season. Initially, things were looking up for 2024.But many of the team’s traps were lost during the storms, and their lab flooded. As of now, they haven’t been able to reset traps or garner useful data. They hope to get more concrete numbers in November.Wirtz, of Pelican Point Seafood, said she’s staying optimistic.The family-owned business is a smaller crabbing operation, and can bring in anywhere from 200 to 400 pounds of crabs per day during an average season. So far, prices have been fairly consistent with 2023 prices, Wirtz said, with medium claws at the market costing $24 per pound, large claws going for $30 per pound and jumbos clocking in at $44.Wirtz said the daily crabbing hauls haven’t yet indicated anything to be concerned about, but it is still too early to tell how the season will shape up.“We’re resilient in the fishery ... we get inventive to bounce back,” she said.Wirtz said she does worry about what will happen if the region experiences a decline in visitors, and a subsequent drop in claw demand.“It is such a sensitive item because it is so expensive,” she said. “You’re excited for the season but everyone is just feeling the financial effect of the storms. Is it going to be sustainable? It’s hard to know.”

Stone crab season is off to a slow start in Tampa Bay. Here’s why.

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