King crabs of the world: Species and Distributions

STEVENS, BRAD; LOVRICH, GUSTAVO A.

King crabs of the World

CRC Press

Año: 2014;

When used generically, or in relation to abundance, ?king crab? typically brings to mind a single species, the red king crab Paralithodes camtschaticus (Plate 1).  Historically and commercially, the name ?king crab? has been applied to a number of species, including the blue king crab P. platypus, the Hanasaki king crab P. brevipes, and the golden and scarlet king crab, Lithodes aequispinus and L. couesi, respectively, and the southern king crab Lithodes santolla.  All of these reside in the family Lithodidae, subfamily Lithodinae, which included 79 species in 1985 (Dawson and Yaldwyn, 1985), but as of this publication includes 121 species in ten genera, including Lithodes (29 species), Paralithodes (5 species),  Cryptolithodes (3 species), Paralomis (66 species), Lopholithodes (2 species),  Neolithodes (12 species), and Phyllolithodes, Rhinolithodes, Sculptolithodes, Glyptolithodes with only 1 species each (McLaughlin, Chapter 2, this volume).  Otto (Chapter 5, this volume) relates the historical usage of the term ?king crab?.  For most of this book, we will concentrate on the six major commercial species within the genera Paralithodes and Lithodes.  Although most species in the family Lithodidae belong to the genus Paralomis, they are of little commercial interest, tend to occupy deep water, and there is not enough biological information on any of them to support a dedicated treatise at this time. A complete description of the various species of king crabs and keys to their identification can be found in Dawson and Yaldwyn (1985), and specific characteristics of the major families are provided in McLaughlin (Chapter 2, this volume).  Rather than include all of this previously published information, those portions relevant to the commercial species are included below.