November 26, 2025 — Each December the North Pacific Fishery Management Council sets the Total Allowable Catches (TACs) for all groundfish species in federal waters of the Bering Sea and Gulf of Alaska for two years. Those waters – from three to 200 miles out – provide over 60% of Alaska’s total fishery landings.
This massive range covers approximately 900,000 square miles and includes over 140 fish and crab species through six different Fishery Management Plans (FMPs).
The value of the combined groundfish fisheries tops $2 billion annually at first wholesale (the value after primary processing). Of that, nearly 75% leaves the state of Alaska and goes primarily to Seattle.
The North Pacific Council also sets the rates of bycatch that go along with all those groundfish catches.
Bering Sea trawl bycatch tops the allowed takes of snow crab and Tanner crab for fishermen
Crab bycatch numbers are indicated as individual animals by fishery managers, but to make things more confusing, crab catches by fishermen are listed in poundage.
For the 2025/2026 season, crabbers are allocated 2.68 million pounds of red king crab. That equals about 382,857 crabs based on an average weight of 7 pounds each. The allowable trawl bycatch for red king crab is 97,000 animals.
For Snow crab (opilio), the fishermen’s catch of 9.3 million pounds adds up to 6.2 million individual crabs weighing 1.5 pounds on average.
The allowable trawl bycatch for Snow crab is 12,850,000 animals.
For bairdi Tanner crab, the crabber’s pots can haul up a total of 11.25 million pounds – 10.12 million pounds from the Western district and 1.13 million pounds from the Eastern district. That equals 3.75 million crabs, based on an average weight of three pounds per crab.
The allowable trawl bycatch for bairdi Tanners is 3.95 million animals.
By far, most of the crab and halibut bycatch is taken by the Seattle-based Amendment 80 fleet of nearly 20 huge factory trawlers that drag the bottom of the Bering Sea for flounders and other groundfish.