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Show GOLD RUSH Fishermen Hit It Rich CORDOVA, Alaska Alaska's crab fishermen have struck it rich a $300-a-day bonanza. The strike is as rich as any of the lucky old-time sourdoughs early day gold findings. "A yarn that a couple of men were making $300 a day in a new gold strike would arouse terrific excitement." ex-citement." Clarence Martin, Cordova Cor-dova Times publisher report. "Yet the crab fishermen are making that kind of money. and it is just as good as if it came in nuggets." Cordova is one of the big producers pro-ducers of canned and frozen crab. The species is known on the Pacific coast as the Dungeness. But until recently all of the Cordova area catch was taken from Prince William Wil-liam sound, adjacent to the town. Catch 3,000 a Day Because the sound's crab beds always supplied enough of a catch to make a good living for the fishermen, fish-ermen, few of them ever ventured outside. It was during the closed season in the sound that a venturesome fisherman decided to try his luck in the Gulf of Alaska the vast body of north Pacific water that washes the breadth of Alaska's southern coast. He put out his traps and brought in a first day's haul of 3,000 crabs. A Cordova pacjdng plant paid him 15 cents a crab $450 for his day's efforts. Some half a dozen fishermen were working the same area, each I with from 100 to 150 traps. After several weeks of fishing, the boats continued to bring in from 1,800 to 2,500 crabs each. Small boats are manned usually by a man and a boy, or by two men at most, so ' the daily take has been running $150 to $200 each. Since the fishermen already had the traps for the Prince William sound fishing, just about the only additional expense is for the bait and the boat operation. Processors Earn Big Pay The men and women who process the crab meat are making big money, too. The packing plant crab 'shakers' they literally shake the meat from the shells are the elite of the packing crews. A skilled 'shaker' can remove about 450 pounds of meat a day. At nine and a half cents 'a pound, that's $42.75 for a day's leg shaking. All this is happening in a season when the crab catch has been slim in such normally happy hunting grounds as Washington state costal waters. Cordova fishermen believe they have tapped a vast storehouse of crab meat, and that they have only touched the edges. |