Reducing the number of crabs in the sea is more effective at protecting humpback whales than more advanced measures to protect them, including real-time population monitoring. This conclusion was reached by American scientists from the University of California at Santa Barbara. To work published In the scientific journal Biological Conservation (BioCon).
“We were trying to find out what types of management strategies would work best to reduce whale entanglement in crab fisheries without significantly impacting the fishery. We found that some simple solutions, such as reducing the amount of dedicated equipment, outperformed more complex methods,” said Christopher Free, lead author of the study.
Crab crabs pose no threat to large whales, but sea giants often become entangled in strong cables used to pull the gear to the surface.
The team created a computer model to examine different methods of protecting whales from crab pots, based on crab abundance, whale behavior and crabbing practices. They concluded that reducing the number of traps by 30% would minimize entanglements.
Scientists say a better solution for both crabbers and whales may be ropeless traps. Such technologies already exist, but high-tech devices are much more expensive than simple structures consisting of mesh and metal frames. Another effective method would be to add more than one trap to a line.
Previous scientists discovered unusually high levels of mutations in whales.