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Crabbing in Coupeville 101 ! A beginners Guide .

I helped David Kelleher with his " Traps " or what we call crab pots in England .
Here is what I learned - a photo guide to " crabbing ".A good location is important - local knowledge is a great help . Wear the right clothes for the conditions . Crabbing is messy and it can be cold out on the water .
Take your time and enjoy your surroundings !

Bring along plenty of good bait - in this case salmon waste purchased from a local fish market .
Go out to your traps and carefully pull them in hand over hand being carefull to keep the rope tidy and your standing area uncluttered .. In this case the traps were on about 100' of line at about 60' depth max .
Bring the trap into the boat in one smooth movement taking care with your balance and footing .
Next sort out the "leagal" crabs from the rest carefully returning the others .

In Washington you are only allowed to take 5 crabs per person per day during the crabbing season though one " crabber " can help others who have the required liscence . In our case that was for 5 people so a maximum of 25 crabs were allowed ! Each trap is atatched to a red and white cram bouey which must be marked with the owners name and phone number !You can only take males who pass the guage test . A male can easily be destinguished from a female as they have a long thin shape on their abdomen as this example in the bucket . Females have an almost round shape in this location .


The inner bait cage is then generously filled both to attract crabs and also to feed them so that the smaller crabs and the females grow and have more babys to ensure a plentiful supply of healthy crabs are maintained for harvesting .



The traps have small openings to allow the smaller crabs to escape and bars that open to allow in the larger crabs but which automatically shut to stop them from escaping .

When handling crabs hold them at the rear and keep away from the claws .

When your catch limit is reached or you run out of pots return to the shore where your catch should be processed by first humanely killing the crabs before seperating the meat from the waste .
The seagulls soon tidy up the area !





The good parts are then washed and steamed for about 20 minutes before being stored or shared .

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