272 THE WEALTH OF THE SEA 



the center of the hard crab fishery. The cooking and 

 picking operations are performed in the same way 

 as in the preparation of crab meat, except that all 

 three grades of meat are canned together. Some 

 crab meat is also canned in Maryland, Maine, Missis- 

 sippi, and Alaska. In most cases, however, the busi- 

 ness is carried on merely as a side-line to a fresh 

 crab meat or some other canning industry. The total 

 volume of business is small, usually being less than 

 fifty thousand dollars a year. 



There are many crabs other than the blue crab 

 found on our shores. Various crabs are thought to 

 resemble such things as bugs, spiders, and horse- 

 shoes and for this reason have been given curious 

 names. Thus we have fiddler, hermit, king, horseshoe, 

 Jonah, lady, sand-bug, and spider crabs. The popu- 

 lar names of other crabs are indicative of their color 

 or habitat, such as green, yellow-shore, purple-shore, 

 red, kelp, sand, mud, mussel, oyster, rock, and stone 

 crabs. Most of these crustaceans are of little economic 

 importance. The rock-crab, Jonah-crab, stone-crab, 

 and the common Pacific crab. Cancer magister, are 

 all fished commercially to some extent. 



The fishery for the common crab of the Pacific 

 coast is of importance in Washington and Alaska. 

 The methods of catching this crab resemble more 

 closely those employed in the lobster fishery than 

 those of the blue-crab fishery, for these crustaceans 

 are caught in hoop-nets and traps. The Pacific crab 

 attains a somewhat larger size than the blue crab 

 of the Chesapeake Bay. 



