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The region's commercial crab fishermen were outraged last fall when the department closed its November 2004 red king crab fishery, worth about $1.5 million.

The annual red king crab stock survey is the department's main tool for regulating the fishery and state regulators have been restricting the fishery for years due to low counts.

Since the 2004 closure, fishermen have been trying to convince the department that the survey is flawed and drastically undercounts the red king crab population.

"It's pretty clear to us that there are more crab here (now) than there have been in the past," said Dick Gregg, a Swanson Harbor crab fisherman and member of the Southeast Alaska King and Tanner Crab Task Force.

The goal is to get "an unbiased review on how we can make (the survey) better," Hebert said.

The panel will also review whether the state's survey technique - in which a computer randomly selects crab pot locations - is acceptable, Hebert said.

Two Juneau scientists and one retired state biologist from Petersburg will serve on the panel, which is expected to publish a report in late summer or fall 2005.

The panelists are Tom Shirley and Terry Quinn, both faculty members at Juneau's University of Alaska Fairbanks School of Fisheries and Ocean Sciences, and Tim Koeneman, a retired Fish and Game biologist who headed the shellfish program for many years.

"We've got confidence in the people who are doing (the review). We had a hand in selecting them," Gregg said.

The panel will convene June 27 in Juneau at the Department of Fish and Game to review crab survey methods, data and other information. The panel has been asked to address a slate of questions drafted by the state biologists and the Southeast Alaska King and Tanner Crab Task Force.

Crab fishermen say they have a lot at stake in the red king crab fishery. There are about 70 permit holders.

"I have a $10,000 payment (on a loan) that I have to make every year for my permit," said Al Morin, a Juneau crab fisherman.

"When I don't get a fishery, I don't make enough money" to pay towards the loan, Morin said.