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Why Ten Billion Snow Crabs Disappeared Off the Coast of Alaska
(www.smithsonianmag.com)
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this post was submitted on 22 Oct 2023
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I am curious how long it will take for them to recover. 90% is a huge population decline.
There are many factors that play into that.
First off each female can produce 100,000 eggs per year. So even thos a 90% decline in numbers sounds horrendous, the population numbers can be replaced quickly.
It takes 5-8 years for the crabs to reach full maturity and start reproducing. Harvest size for the males is 7-9 years.
So on first look you think around 8 years for the population to recover.
However in nature something tends to fill the vacuum left by the decrease of a population. Other species who compete with the crabs for food increase in numbers.
Then there is the die off of predators that relied on the crab as a food source. This might allow the crab population to increase faster than normal.
There is also the increase of predators that feed on the species replacing the crab. Supressing the competition to the crabs.
Each of these species has their own lifecycles and timing.
So the bottom line, it could take 6 years or 600 years. We don't know.
They probably lay 100.000 eggs because only 100 make it into adulthood and the others don't hatch, get eaten, sick or starve before...
In a stable population, 2 would make it to adulthood every generation. If an adult female produces eggs for 10 years, that's 1:500K make it to adulthood. The ocean has a lot of hungry mouths.
Well that’s quicker than I was anticipating.
They also might just go extinct. We literally don't know.
Never; they'll go extinct with all (including us the people).