50,000 Juvenile Japanese Mitten Crabs Released into Nakdong River Estuary Ecosystem

Fifty thousand juvenile Japanese mitten crabs will be released to restore the brackish water ecosystem of the Nakdong River estuary.

The Ministry of Climate, Energy and Environment and the Korea Water Resources Corporation announced that they will hold a release event for the Japanese mitten crabs at Eulsukdo Island in the Nakdong River estuary tomorrow afternoon (June 18).

A brackish water ecosystem is an estuary area where seawater and freshwater mix, serving as a habitat for unique and diverse organisms that thrive in specific environmental conditions, such as varying salinity levels.

This release was organized to restore the health of the Nakdong River estuary's brackish water ecosystem.

The Japanese mitten crabs being released were raised by the Busan Metropolitan City Fisheries Resources Research Institute, which hatched eggs from wild-caught mother crabs and nurtured them to a size of at least 0.7 centimeters.

The Japanese mitten crab is a representative species inhabiting brackish water areas; they grow in rivers and migrate downstream to the sea in the autumn to spawn.

(Photo: Courtesy of Ulju-gun, Yonhap News)
※ Please note: This article was translated by AI and may contain errors.