Fish Factor, Higher ocean acidity is affecting Bering Sea crab shell production and immune systems

Increasingly corrosive oceans are raising more red flags for Bering Sea crab stocks.

Results from a first ever, two year project on baby Tanner crabs show that higher ocean acidity (pH) affects both their shell production and the immune systems. Bairdi Tanner crab, the larger cousins of snow crab, are growing into one of Alaska’s largest crab fisheries with a nearly 20 million pound harvest this season.

“We put mom crabs from the Bering Sea in a tank, and allowed her embryos to grow and hatch in an acidified treatment,” explained project leader Bob Foy, director of the NOAA Fisheries laborator...