With the weather looking decidedly dodgy for boating the decision was made to try for a few crabs in a new area that we havent crabbed before.Some of you may recognise the creek. Andy and i walked 6 pots in to the creek and surrounding mangrove flats.When crabbing a new area i like to split my pots between pots that will be in the water at all tides and pots that will only be in water a couple hours either side of high tide.Two large metal pots were used as well as 4 rectangular collapsible pot(8 dollars each) Some pots were baited with fish frames and some with my favourite bait,fresh chicken frames. Just a tip for crabbing newcomers,always make sure the bait is secure in the centre of the pot,so the crab cant reach thru and get the bait from the outside.Also,weather important or not i always like the entrances to face the direction of the water flow.Saturday morning i awoke to pouring rain.Andy had soccr early so i went by myself.Two of the pots in the creek had been opened and thrown on the bank so these were moved into the mangroves.One of the metal pots baited had 3 bucks and a female,two of the bucks being legal and two of the other pots had one legal each. They were all rebaited and all put into the mangroves. For me the best place to look for is anywhere a drain/gutter runs out.Bearing in mind it doesnt have to be big,or have any water at all at low tide, so long as it looks like there will be flow thru the mangrves at high tide so disperse the bait scent.This morning,accompanied byAndy(sid the sloth)at 5am,we headed off again.The first four pots were unproductive(im thinking in such a narrow mangrove strip,i should have moved the pots further from where i had them the night b4) The two pots i did move,to hide from the share farmers,had a total of 3 legal bucks as well as four smaller ones. One of the bucks,well over legal,was a bit light when pressed on the side of the shell and was returned to his drain(to be caught next big tides)
Crabs have now been cooked,awaiting eating with fresh bread n butter and cracked pepper,washed down with a cold beer...
Just as a side note,Anyone buying mudcrabs,dont always grab the biggest,as often they wont be super full.If you look underneath, a good crab will normally have a dark cross forming on his shell, and normally a smaller jst legal crab will be pretty full.Enough of this..i have crab to eat.
Ps, just a couple tips for the cheaper rectangular pots, Keep the funnels tight with a cable tie and put a cable tie in the middle of the funnel,effectivly making two shorter funnels. his will stop the majority of crabs escaping,while making little or no difference(imho) to the amount of crabs entering the pot.Its a bugger having this available only 15 mins from home....though maybe i need to move closer..