A particularly aggressive crab species from the western Atlantic is threatening Italy’s role as one of the world’s top producers of clams - as well as, potentially, one of its signature pasta dishes.
Meanwhile, across the Atlantic, Maryland is apparently having the opposite problem with the blue crab – not enough.
This was the first thing I thought of.
And the only reason we care is the economic consequences?
Send a few Marylanders with some Old Bay and they’ll fix that problem real fast
It’s in Rome? Holy Crab
Why can’t we just eat it? Isn’t crab meat a delicacy?
It is also home to “spaghetti alle vongole” (spaghetti with clams), a classic of Italian cuisine.
Also it’s certainly better than spaghetti with fucking sand, clam shells and clam meat full of literal shit in them. I’m Italian and can’t understand who would possibly like that?!
This is the best summary I could come up with:
ROME, Aug 2 (Reuters) - A particularly aggressive crab species from the western Atlantic is threatening Italy’s role as one of the world’s top producers of clams - as well as, potentially, one of its signature pasta dishes.
The “blue crab”, originally from the coast of north and south America, has spread across several lagoon-like locations in Italy, preying on local shellfish, fish roe and other aquatic life.
“Juveniles have been almost completely preyed on, for sure we will have next year a very big crisis and shortages in the market,” Emanuele Rossetti from the Fishermen’s Cooperative of the Polesine, part of the Po delta area, told Reuters.
Sasa Raicevich, a marine aquatic resources expert from the Italian Institute for Environmental Protection and Research (ISPRA), said the blue crabs are thought to have arrived in Italy via shipping bilge water.
“Today we caught about 12 (metric) tons … we fish these kind of amounts every day, but we don’t see a fall in the (crab) population”, Rossetti said, adding that their numbers started to get out of control in May.
Last week, farming lobby Coldiretti said the crab “invasion” was turning into a “natural calamity” threatening the survival of 3,000 family firms in the Po delta, and called for government support.
I’m a bot and I’m open source!
This is sad, invasive species are a huge problem around the world. On the upshot blue crabs are absolutely delicious.
A fucking shame, the whole region is already fucked due to the river Po not carrying enough fresh water for the last two years.
