(upbeat music) - I'm Starla Sampaco in the Crosscut KCTS 9 newsroom.

European green crab are invading Washington waters and creating ecological emergencies.

The State and the Lummi Indian Business Council have recently both declared emergencies related to the crab.

In 2021, the Lummi Natural Resources Department pulled nearly 86,000 of the fast-multiplying invaders out of the Lummi Sea Pond.

One of the tribe's most important seafood growing areas.

Keeping an eye out for crab populations before they become problematic is important to keeping them under control.

But trapping, one of the dominant ways to monitor for crab is time and resource intensive.

An emerging surveillance tool, eDNA analysis can play a bigger role in monitoring efforts.

Allowing biologists and citizen scientists to cover more ground simply by taking water samples and looking for genetic evidence of crab.

I'm Starla Sampaco.

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