Dungeness crab season delayed due to excessive whale entanglements.

Due to an excessive number of confirmed whale entanglements in crab fishing gear this year, the California Department of Fish and Wildlife (CDFW) announced Oct. 30 that the fishing season for commercial and recreational Dungeness crab fisheries will be delayed until at least Jan. 1, 2027.

According to the CDFW’s preliminary data for the 2026-27 Dungeness crab fishery risk assessment, nine humpback whales were confirmed entangled off the coast of California, with a majority of the entanglements occurring in Monterey Bay.

“We're on track to have the highest number of humpback whales entangled in a single year ever,” says Geoff Shester, fisheries innovation director and senior scientist for the nonprofit Oceana. “That's partially related to the warm water conditions we're seeing that are pushing the prey closer to shore and overlapping with the fishery, but also I think the fishery managers last season left the season open far too long.”

Preliminary numbers released Oct. 30 by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Fisheries at an Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife public meeting indicate there have already been a total of 47 distinct humpback whale entanglements in 2026 to date off the U.S. West Coast.

Of the nine humpback whales entangled off the coast of California, four were linked to Dungeness crab gear, with two being commercial gear and two recreational gear.

This is the seventh consecutive year that the opener for the season has been delayed due to entanglements. The typical commercial season opener for Dungeness crab is Nov. 15, and the recreational season typically opens Nov. 7 off Central California. The season will typically continue into the early spring until fishery managers determine there are enough whales in a fishing zone to trigger a closure.

Ropeless crab traps, or “pop-up gear,” were approved by the state for the first time for use in the spring earlier this year for all fishers. The gear, which has emerged as an experimental option in recent years to help reduce whale entanglements, has been successfully tested in California in recent years with a 98 percent reliability rate. State regulations currently only allow pop-up gear during fishing closures to conventional crab gear after April 1. 

“With the super El Niño we’re anticipating a whole bunch of unprecedented events to happen. It’s already starting to go haywire,” Shester says. “We know in the past that these heat waves have caused high levels of entanglements and domoic acid.”