The Netherlands, which usually warmly welcomes American visitors, has developed a different attitude toward one group of visitors that just won’t leave: crayfish that arrived in freighter ballast tanks are taking over delicate waterways.
Experts are calling on the Agriculture Ministry to take strong action, and fast, to combat their increase.
Delicious but dangerous, they have multiplied to the tens of millions in the Dutch coastal provinces, where they are a threat to native water flora and fauna. In the environmentally-sensitive Krimpenerwaard area, they dig holes in ditches that criss-cross the area, making the land unstable and dangerous for the cattle that graze there.
In 2016, officials thought they had a solution: They gave professional fishermen open licenses to catch as many as possible and sell them as seafood, but the ‘explosive’ breeding rate of the crayfish in an environment they are well-adapted to, and where they have no natural predators, has made that unsuccessful.
