Landed as Snow Crab

They were always down there, a few: snow crab crossed with Tanner, the mouth bent to a curve, the eyes another color, never more than one in ten of the males worth landing.

Then the Bering ran warm two years, the spring ice barely came, and the snow crab went, by the billions.

Nobody let the cousins in. The models were careful on that point: not the heat, not more meeting in the dark. Only the room. Less eaten or less crowded out (the paper won't say which), more of the in-between grew up.

Last year it was two in five of the males the boats could keep. The plan that sets the catch has no line for them. At the dock they're counted as what they took the place of.