Huge numbers of octopuses have been causing problems for shellfishermen on the south Devon coast.

Alan Deer from Beesands is a third-generation crab fisherman and Vice-Chair of South Devon and Channel Shellfishermen.

He explained what happened: "We've been seeing them for the last two years, a little bit on and off.

"Five years ago it would have been a rarity to see one but the last couple of years, you'd see enough of a few and you'd go, oh, that's a bit more interesting.

"But about the end of February this year, it just seemed like a mass explosion of the population.

"The pots were just full of them.."

There have been previous 'blooms' in 1899 and 1950 and they can kill off crabs, lobsters and scallops.

"We heard back in sort of 2021-22 that the French had started seeing them on their coast.

"Last year the Channel Islands had massive problems doing their lobster fishery over there, and they're in a worse situation because they struggled to sell it over there, so it's as bad for them as anyone.

Alan outlined the problem: " We historically fish the same grounds my father, my grandfather did.

"We don't move very far.

"And it's the same as most of the inshore boats working out of Dartmouth, out of Salcombe.

"The problem we're seeing now is that the octopus is just in such large numbers that they're going into the pots, devastating any crab or lobster that's in there and also they're killing what's on the ground as well.

"The lobster stock just seems to be devastating this season so far.

Alan said it's not all news when it comes to sales: "It's very sporadic. "Some of our boats are seeing large quantities of them and some boats that are fishing right alongside them aren't seeing any.

"So it's strange how they're moving.

"Some of the skippers are doing okay and some are having a real hard time but yes, yes, you can make money out of it.

"It's quite good money currently.

"A lot of it's going to Italy and Spain, from what I understand.

"That's the main two exports.

"So we land what we catch into Brixham.

"With most of our shellfish, we have contracts with buyers that meet us on the quay.

"We supply a blue seafood company in Paignton called Top Catch, and they supply all the Michelin restaurants in London for the large male crabs.

"It's a slightly different market to the octopus.

"We're not used to running up to Brixham, which is a bit of a novelty and a new thing for us, putting it on the market."

"What we're concerned about is when and if these octopuses move on, what's going to be left behind, which we think is going to be nothing.

"We want more information from the government really whether they think this is going to be a permanent situation or whether they think this is just another bloom like happened historically in the past, and what can be done for the shellfishermen to help them in this situation going forward?”