Why is it so expensive to spend 2,500 yuan on a king crab?

When you walk into the seafood section of a supermarket, a king crab priced at 2,500 yuan in front of you can't help but catch your attention. Although for people with a monthly salary of 3,000 yuan, such a "luxury" is not within their consideration, you still can't help but ask: Why is the king crab so expensive?

Broadly speaking, king crabs belong to the family of decapod crabs, with more than 100 species in the world. However, in the market, there are mainly four common king crab varieties: red king crab, blue king crab, golden king crab and South American king crab.

King crabs are not actually crabs in the traditional sense. The biggest difference is that king crabs only have one pair of claws and three pairs of walking legs, one pair less than ordinary crabs.

Among all king crabs, the red king crab is the most famous. An adult red king crab can weigh up to 10 kilograms, and its legs can be up to 1.5 meters when spread out. Those long-lived red king crabs can live up to 20 to 30 years.

The scientific name of the red king crab is "Kamchatka stone crab". Its earliest distribution range is concentrated in the cold waters along the coast of the North Pacific, such as the Kamchatka Peninsula, the Bering Strait, and the Bristol Bay in the United States.

In the 1960s, Soviet scientists introduced king crabs from the Kamchatka Peninsula to the Barents Sea. Subsequently, these king crabs continued to expand their territory and even began to invade Norwegian waters. Therefore, Norwegians also jokingly called them "Stalin's Red Army". Since then, Norway has become an important producer of king crabs.

In order to protect the breeding season of king crabs, Alaska's crab boats usually operate from October to January each year, with an operating cycle of 2 to 4 weeks.

During this period, the Arctic Circle often encounters blizzards, and the crew on the crab boats must work in extremely cold weather with temperatures close to zero and fine snow. They are often accompanied by strong winds of more than 26 kilometers per hour and huge waves of more than 10 meters. They are always in danger of being swallowed by huge waves.

At present, commercial crab fishing mainly uses crab pots for fishing. Crab pots are composed of steel frames and covered with nylon nets. They are usually about 2 meters long and wide and about 1 meter high. Each empty crab pot can weigh up to 300 kilograms, which makes its operation very dangerous.

When fishing, you first need to put bait in the crab cage, usually herring or cod, then tie a buoy and sink it to the seabed three or four hundred meters deep by a powerful crane. It usually takes one to two days to catch red king crabs or blue king crabs, while it takes longer to catch golden king crabs.

According to relevant regulations, only male king crabs with a back shell of more than 178 mm can be caught, and any king crabs that do not meet the standards must be returned to the sea.

Qualified king crabs will be temporarily stored in the water tank on the ship. Because the king crabs in the water tank are very fragile, low water temperature or overcrowding may cause them to die, greatly reducing their commercial value.

In order to avoid resource depletion, major king crab producing areas such as Russia, the United States, and Norway have strict fishing regulations, the most important of which is to prevent overfishing. For example, in 2020-2021, the total catch set by the Alaska Fisheries Office was 4,065.1 tons; Norway's catch quota was 1,810 tons; Russia's catch quota was the highest, reaching 39,144 tons.

Most of these fishing quotas are allocated by fishing companies, and individuals can often only conduct commercial crab fishing through leasing.

In addition, crab fishing boats must also be licensed. Taking the United States as an example, in 2020-2021, only 99 crab fishing boats were licensed.

Among them, a crab fishing boat named "Northwest", built in 1977, is 38 meters long and can accommodate 200 crab pots. It is one of the larger crab fishing boats.

Before 2005, king crab fishing in the United States adopted a derby fishing model, with about 250 ships competing fiercely in a short window period. The crew needed to race against polar storms and time to catch as many king crabs as possible. In the shortest year, the fishing quota was completed in just 4 days. Therefore, crab fishing was once considered one of the most dangerous occupations in the fishing industry.

From 1991 to 1996, the death rate of Alaska crab fishermen was as high as 356 per 100,000 people, much higher than the death rate of other fishing jobs.

After 2000, with the implementation of ship stability inspections and fishing quotas, the death rate of crab fishermen has dropped significantly, but accidents still occur from time to time.

For example, on February 11, 2017, the crab boat "Destination" disappeared after passing St. George Island. The six crew members did not send any distress signals and all died. In the early morning of December 31, 2019, the crab boat "Scandy Rose" capsized, and only two of the seven crew members survived.

The growth environment of king crabs is extremely harsh, and the strict fishing regulations and difficult fishing conditions have kept its price at the "king level".

In 2017, a seafood company in Hunchun, Jilin, opened the "Kamchatka-Zarubino-Hunchun" route and imported more than 2,600 tons of live king crabs in just one year. In the same year, the Russian "TOR" fishing boat regularly supplied fresh king crabs to Shanghai Hengsha Fishing Port.

Even though so many king crabs are imported, I still can’t afford them.

animal tags： Red king crab Alaska king crab