Eat King Crabs for the Environment

King crab populations started from the Soviet Union

While there's a big rush on eating king crabs at the moment in Metro Vancouver Chinese restaurants, apparently because China is not accepting these crustaceans or the economy there is slowing down, and with it demand, we all should be eating more of this species of crab anyway.

That's because there are too many of them and fishermen can't catch them fast enough.

Each female king crab produces 400,000 to 500,000 eggs in her lifetime, and as a result several thousands of these crabs survive and develop into maturity, and with no natural enemies or food competition, these crabs are spreading fast.

Originally they were around northern Russia, but have now spread to the west coast of Norway.

You can blame Josef Stalin for setting off the explosive population of king crabs.

In the 1930s Stalin wanted to support the Barents Sea fishery in the North Pacific, and these crustaceans soon became the delicacy of choice for some Soviet generals, and it was more convenient to have live king crabs delivered from this northern body of water to Moscow.

Then in 1961 a Soviet biologist by the name of Yuri Orlov released 1.5 million king crab larvae into the Barents Sea on state orders. 

These king crabs pose an environmental threat, as they eat everything it comes across, including worms, snails, fish eggs, mussels and sea urchins.

The crabs could also affect fish stocks in cod, herring and pollock in the next few years.

However, it seems global warming is affecting the king crab population, not overfishing. The crabs are moving further north to colder waters, which makes it harder to catch them.

So if you need a good excuse to eat king crabs, do it for the environment. The seafood industry will thank you.