Vol. 53 - Alaska Resources Library and Information Services

5.0 DISTRIBUTION AND ABUNDANCE OF OTHER BRACHYURAN LARVAE IN THE
SOUTHEASTERN BERING SEA WITH EMPHASIS ON ERIMACRUS ISENBECKII
Deborah Wencker
5.1 Introduction
There is little detailed literature on the life histories, distribution,
and abundance of Brachyura in the southeastern Bering Sea belonging
to the families Atelecyclidae (hair crab), Cancridae (Cancer crab),
Majidae (spider crabs, other than Chionoecetes bairdi and C. opilio),
and Pinnotheridae (pea crab) (see Tables 5.1, 5.2 for summary).
Species
without commercial value are either little studied and/or are not
reported even though they are often caught incidentally during groundfish
surveys.
From our own experience onboard such cruises we know that
noncommercial crabs and shrimp are often caught in high numbers, sorted
to species, and logged in data banks.
Processed agency reports mention
only general listings of total shrimp or noncommercial crab (e.g.,
Pereyra et al. 1976), or present summary statements on these Crustacea
as incidental taxa and therefore, part of communities in which
commercial species reside.
Some investigators, however, have provided
more information on other Brachyura caught, such as catch incidences and
biomass (Feder et al. 1981).
Inclusion of noncommercial crab among taxa
used for analyses of species associations have helped to indicate
characteristic biological assemblages in which they are found (Smith and
Bakkala 1982; Smith and Walters, 1982).
Sparse coverage in such reports may be due to several factors,
including:
1) no commercial value; 2) low abundance; or 3) low
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