Table 2. --Minimum distance crabs traveled between tagging and 



recovery 



Distance traveled 



Tagged crabs recovered 



232 



100. 



Table 3. --Average depth by month of tagged king crabs recaptured in the 

 Shumagin Islands area, Alaska, 1957-62 



Month 



Recaptures with 

 depth information 



Average depth 



h at horns 

 31 



65 

 71 

 83 



18 

 25 

 33 



22 



King crabs, because of their rigid exo- 

 skeletons, are able to increase in size only 

 immediately after molting and before their 

 new shells become hardened. Growth is there- 

 fore determined by increment per molt and 

 molt frequency information. Three intensive 

 growth studies on the Alaskan king crab have 



been made: at Kodiak (Powell, 1960); in Cook 

 Inlet (Bright, Durham, and Knudsen, I960); 

 and in the Bering Sea (Weber and Miyahara, 

 1961). Males and females grow at a similar 

 rate until sexual maturity. In the first years 

 of life, several molts occur per year. Molt 

 frequency decreases as size increases, how- 

 ever, and is annual when sexual maturity is 

 reached. Up till this time, growth increment 



