King crab legs for $199 a pound? There’s a reason for that.

Historically cold temperatures made it difficult for invasive species survive in Alaska. The Japanese skeleton shrimp Caprella mutica is now established in Unalaska area and in this observation observed on a buoy line in Nateekin Bay.

The Lummi Nation has declared a disaster after removing 70,000 invasive European green crabs from their sea pond in November. According to Seattle-based King News, the Lummi Nation cultivates shellfish and juvenile salmon in their 750-acre sea pond. The European green crab preys on young oysters, clams, and are known to dig down into the sand, uprooting eel grass, which is habitat for juvenile salmon.

The winter commercial crabbing season in the Norton Sound will begin February 25 with a quota less than half of its 2018 figure and a third of the 2017 quota.

The results of the Plate Watch program only indicated one invasive species in the area, Caprella mutica, otherwise known as the Japanese skeleton shrimp.

Crayfish were first observed on Kodiak around 2015. Now, a local tribal organization is studying their movement, distribution and diet.

The Common Rock Crab has begun to grow rapidly in number around Icelandic shores. It was first seen in Hvalfjörður, West Iceland, in the year 2006. This summer, it has reached Eyjafjörður in North Iceland.

For decades, the crab piled up in fishing boats like gold coins hauled from a rich and fertile sea. But the very ocean that nursed these creatures may prove to be this industry’s undoing.Scientists fear ocean acidification will drive the collapse of Alaska's iconic crab fishery.

As ocean temperatures trend warmer than average, green crab larvae dispersed in ocean currents from more southern latitudes will find more suitable habitat along the Alaska coast. Recently, adult green crabs have been detected in Skidegate Inlet on Haida Gwaii, British Columbia, and larval crabs have been found in Prince Rupert, both less than 100 miles south of Ketchikan.