Here's how newly approved pop-up traps could extend Bay Area crab season: 'A hard-fought battle'

"But Little and a number of other boats were able to stay out longer thanks to permits that allowed them to use special ropeless pop-up traps. The technology was considered experimental when Little first gave us a demonstration. The traps sit on the ocean floor with no buoy or line for whales to become entangled in. When it's time to retrieve the traps, fisherman activate the pop-up buoy by remote control and reel in the catch."

""We've moved past the experiment phase and the testing, and now they can commercially fish with this and then keep all those crabs. So, well, we'll be seeing this in the marketplace starting this spring," he said. Shester also said the testing resulted in a system that allows both the fishing fleets and marine law enforcement to track the locations of the traps and adds that crews have made more than 1,000 deployments and retrieved the traps with 98% reliability."

Ropeless pop-up crab traps sit on the ocean floor without buoys or lines, eliminating the typical entanglement risk to migrating whales. Fishermen remotely activate a pop-up buoy to retrieve traps and catch, enabling continued spring fishing after earlier closures. California approved the gear for general use across the entire fleet after several seasons of testing. Testing included more than 1,000 deployments with about 98% retrieval reliability and added location-tracking for both fishing fleets and marine law enforcement. Testing showed the gear to be reliable and profitable, allowing fishermen to keep their catch and continue commercial operations.

Read at ABC7 San Francisco