59 
In the case of the crab there is reason to believe that the adults 
are more liable to destruction when they are soft. It is impossible 
to state to what extent, and for our purpose it will be convenient to 
assume that the 20 per cent, includes the losses from this cause, 
and from the captures made by the trawlers in the winter. If we 
assume that 100,000 are thus lost the population of crabs may be 
estimated to be about 8,000,000. 
On page 41 it was shown that the proportion of the sexes appears 
to be males, 48 ; females, 52. It is a fact, however, to which attention 
has been drawn in this paper that very few berried females are 
accounted for in the catches of the fishermen. The principal reason 
is that the berried female could not easily find her way into the crab 
pot. Were it not for this unavoidable error in the figures at our 
disposal, it is more than likely that the figures would be more nearly 
approximate to those given for lobsters. Under the circumstances 
it may be allowable to assume that the proportion of males is 46 and 
females 54, the latter including say 18 in the berried condition. 
The 8,000,000 crabs may thus be said to consist of 3,680,000 
males and 4,320,000 females, of which latter 1,440,000 are berried. 
Each berried crab may be said to liberate 1,000,000 larvae, and 
the total annual contribution of larvae would be therefore about 
1,440,000,000,000. 
Maturity is reached in about five years, and the annual survival 
to this period would require to be 1,600,000 to keep up the popu- 
lation. This would mean a survival of 1 in 900,000, or about again 
one crab to each berried female. 
Whatever may be said for or against the assumptions in the 
above calculations there is no denying the fact that the death-rate 
in both species is a very heavy one, and particularly so in the case 
of the crab. 
Perhaps the most serious objection, apart from criticisms of the 
estimation of the fishing strength, which may be urged against the 
figures, is that the district is regarded as being self-contained, 
whereas it is probable that an east- coast district like ours depends 
upon the slightly more northern portion of the coast for some part 
of its annual supplies of young stages. It is impossible to state to 
what extent this is true or of importance, but the differential legisla- 
tion on the east coast offers a chance, after the lapse of a number of 
years, of indicating how far one district may be dependent upon 
another. 
