Crab-yaking

Our good friend Tony Mooney and I went kayak crabbing yesterday.

The tide was starting to come in when we arrived at the north side of Alsea Bay near the old Bayshore Inn. Tony had gone out the previous day and caught a bunch of nice Dungeness Crabs, so he kindly called and asked if I'd like to go along for a repeat trip.

We unloaded our boats and gear and packed everything down the bank and over the exposed barnacle covered rocks to the water's edge. I was going to try using a fishing rod with a baited loop snare on the end of the line and Tony was using the two large sized crab traps that he easily handles from his 12 foot, ride on top kayak (ROTK). My little 9 foot sit inside kayak (SINK) however, is too tippy to pull that much weight out of the water, even with the pontoon outriggers I made for it.

The north wind and incoming tide proved to be more than I could handle, by the time I'd get set up with my dinky rig I'd be on my way out to the middle of the bay, have to pull it back in and paddle like crazy to get back to where I'd started. I finally gave up and decided to just take pictures of Tony as he worked his crab traps.

We paddled to the shoreline, Tony packed my ineffective crabbing gear back up to his truck and we headed back out. He has his own super-secret time to let his traps set, or “soak” as the old crabbers say, and the trip to his truck had extended it quite a bit. He strained and grunted as he hand over hand pulled the heavy trap up to his kayak, and with a great heave flopped it onto the deck between his legs. It was loaded with crabs.

I snapped pictures while he separated and threw back the usual females, and small males from the writhing, snapping, pinching mob, until he narrowed it down to two large male Dungeness Crabs.

“I don't even have to measure these!” he yelled. (To be legal they have to be male and 5 ¾ inches across.)

“That's a good start!” he yelled, as the wind commenced to blow me back out into the bay. Every time I'd quit paddling in order to take a picture I'd lose ground and have to paddle furiously to get back in position again. Tony had the same problem but he's in better shape and a lot younger!

My arms started to give out around noon and I headed for the shore. About that time Tony's mom drove up and he came in to show her the four crabs he'd kept so far. While we watched he went back out and pulled his traps several more times, ending up with six crabs total.

It was quite a workout for me, but I enjoyed every minute of it.