Unalaska, AK – A few boats have started in on the 2007 opilio crab season in the Bering Sea, now that one processor has put up a price for crab.

Westward Seafoods is offering $1.525 a pound for A shares, although agreements haven't been reached on B and C shares yet, according to Greg White, who negotiates prices for the Inter-Cooperative Exchange and represents about 70 percent of the Bering Sea crab fleet. White said that the price is a little short of what fishermen wanted, but it's still something they're willing to go to work for.

"We were hoping to get $1.60," White said. "I don't think people are tremendously disappointed--I don't think they're tremendously excited about that number either, but it's enough to get people to go fishing."

The Westward price is a substantial increase over what fishermen were paid last season. Some processors offered as little as $0.85 a pound for opilio in 2006, the result of a glut of the product on the U.S. and Japanese markets. But this year demand has picked up, and the price has risen with it.

White said the boats fishing for Westward are on their way out to drop pots, although the rest of the fleet is still in Dutch Harbor or fishing Pacific cod in the region. There haven't been any opilio deliveries to onshore processors in Dutch Harbor yet, but about 1.5 million pounds have been taken by the catcher-processor fleet so far, which is unusual this early in the season.

Although under crab rationalization the opilio season technically begins in October, most boats still start fishing in mid-January.