EFFECTIVENESS OF A SUGARCANE FISH COMBINATION AS BAIT IN TRAPPING SWIMMING CRABS

Swimming crabs are known to be highly sensitive to saccharides, in res ponse to which they show strong food searching behaviour. This study w as done to examine the possibility of using sugarcane as an attractant in basket traps for Portunus pelagicus and Charybdis japonica during their reproductive season. A bait combination of sugarcane and fish wa s found more effective than fish bait alone, whereas sugarcane alone w as ineffective. The use of the sugarcane-fish combination resulted in an extremely male-biased catch of P. pelagicus, one result of which wo uld be the conservation of the population of this crab.