This is from the Barents Sea:
Is there a similar problem in the Bering Sea??
PS> Google translate traps (teine) as bones (bein) for some obscure reason.
To a point. Most crab and fish trap fisheries and all US lobster fisheries require an escape panel that is held in place with hog rings made of low quality iron meant to degrade within 6 months to a year, depending on the laws specific to that fishery. At that point the 'ghost trapâbecomes bottom structure.
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I believe there are similar rules in Norway.
I know there are a requirement for an escape way for undersized crab to escape
For the Snow crab traps used by Norwegian vessel the requirement is to have a section cut out and and refitted with biodegradable cotton twine, thus limit on the time overstaying traps will be ghost fishing:
Left: Dimension of the retrieved pots resembling the ones used by the Norwegian fishing fleet (Nguyen et al., 2019). Right: All pots had sections of the pot cut loose and sewn using a different twine of 5 mm diameter. Sections like these are normally sewn with biodegradable twine as a measure to prevent ghost fishing (Winger et al., 2015).
PS> It is not only Norwegian vessels that catch Snow Crabs in the Norwegian EEZ of the Barents Sea.
The report from âRemĂžyâ did say that this was âseveral weeksâ after the Snow Crab season had ended, but not how many weeks. Nor did it say how many % of the traps that had crabs in them and how many had degraded to let live crabs escape.
This report from 2019 is from an expeditions to the Barents Sea, paid for by the Norwegian Government, to clear some of the lost traps: