Florida’s stone crab season kicks off Tuesday. Did Hurricane Helene, Milton pinch supplies of seafood delicacy?

South Florida’s stone crab season kicks off this Tuesday, Oct. 15, and despite back-to-back hurricanes barreling through the Gulf of Mexico, early signs point to abundant claws and prices even with last season.

Fresh claws will hit fish markets, wholesalers and restaurant menus as soon as Wednesday, the morning after crabbing vessels are allowed to pull traps by state law. Yet the big question remains: Just how much will stone crabs cost fans of the sweet crustacean treat?

Dewey Culbreth, owner of Catfish Dewey’s in Oakland Park, says prices usually mirror the tail end of the previous season, which ended May 1. But the double-whammy of Hurricanes Helene and Milton has muddled that conventional wisdom, he says. A few Gulf Coast suppliers sustained storm damage to boats and fish houses, and now he’s expecting lower-than-average initial hauls after both storms.

“This means that some guys have lost a lot of traps, and there might be less crabs caught, which could affect prices at least in the beginning,” Culbreth told the Sun Sentinel on Sunday. “It’s really kind of a sad situation.”

Even so, he’s optimistic. Earlier this spring, Culbreth saw a bumper crop of claws flood his seafood restaurant — so many, in fact, that he froze his final haul and kept selling them through the end of August. At the end of last season, he charged $44 per-pound for medium-size claws, $49 for larges and $75 for 1.25 pounds of jumbos.

“I’m betting prices will open up high but if the catch remains robust, it will drive prices back down flat with last season,” he adds. “We’re already seeing lots of crabs in the traps.”

Culbreth says Catfish Dewey’s all-you-can-eat deal is pending until traps are pulled on Tuesday. For now, the cost is “market price” on his restaurant website.

During the 2024-25 season, which runs Oct. 15 to May 1, most of Florida’s stone crabs are caught in muddy waters off the Gulf of Mexico, Florida Keys and Florida Bay, with some fisheries working the areas near the Bahamas and Crystal River, near Florida’s Big Bend region. In a meeting last week the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, which regulates how many crabs can be caught, set new guidelines for crab traps, now required to be fitted with a 2 3/16-inch-wide “escape ring” with a “vertical exterior trap wall” to filter out undersize crabs and to curb overfishing, per its website.

Storm surge, winds and high seas from both hurricanes may have destroyed or scattered crab traps across the Gulf right before the start of season, argues Peter Jarvis, owner of high-end retailer Triar Seafood in Hollywood, who has suppliers in the Keys and the West Coast.

“The traps got tossed all over hell’s half-acre,” Jarvis says. “It left me with a huge question mark about supply and cost. Many crabbers are still without power. Those poor guys are trying to fix their own personal scenarios instead of checking traps. On the other hand, the Keys didn’t get too clobbered and my guys found plenty of stone crabs in their traps. So we just don’t know.”

Kelly Kirk, the sixth-generation owner of Kirk Fish Co. in Goodland, next to Marco Island, counts herself lucky that no crabbing trawlers in her fleet sustained damage in either hurricane. She thinks her waterfront fish house will charge the same claw prices as the end of last season: $28 to $30 for mediums, $38 to $40 for larges and $48 to $50 for jumbos.

“It’ll be slower to start, but prices will be the same,” Kirk says. “We might not have a ton of supply on day one. We didn’t want our traps to get destroyed so we waited to put them in the water after the storms passed.”

Clay Brand, the owner of Captain Clay and Sons Seafood Market in Delray Beach, says his Gulf suppliers also waited until the hurricanes passed to deposit his traps.

“I wouldn’t be surprised if our initial haul is lower since we set traps a lot later than usual,” he says. “I’m still hopeful we’re going to have really good production this year.”

Sun Sentinel reporter Phillip Valys can be reached at moc.lenitnesnus@sylavp.