Penguin Island

SHOALWATER

Blue Manner Crabs

Shoalwater is an awesome spot for catching a variety of fish but on this fishing occasion I decided to hunt down my favourite, blue manner crabs and since at the moment it's crabbing season I simply have to make the most of it.  :) I used 3 crab nets and on this occasion I decided to use lamb necks as my bait, but you can also use tuna heads or chicken wings/legs which is also good crabbing bait. I secured my bait with a wire clip, some people like to use cages to stop blowies from eating the bait but I just let it free flow in the water, plus if there are other people crabbing on the jetty you've got that advantage of luring the crab to your net and not theres :) . I decided to crab just off the jetty so I secured my crab nets round the posts threw them in and checked the nets every 10 minutes. Doing the pull is always the fun, exciting part of crabbing, there's always a few seconds of suspense as to whether you've caught a crab or how many are going to be in the net. At times when I did pull up my nets I would sometimes find 2 crabs in there. I caught a lot of undersized crabs which I put back in the water straight away as you want to preserve the stock for future crabbing, however I did catch 4 big male ones which was enough for me. When measuring my crabs I used a crab gauge, however you can place a small indent in a coke can and use the can to measure the crab. The blue manner crabs have to be a minimum of 127 mm carapace width. It's best to always measure your crabs as the last thing you want to cop is a fine from the fisheries​. The catch limit for catching crabs are 10 per person per day. Whenever I go crabbing I always fill up a big container with sea water and take it home with me, as the best way to cook your crabs is in natural sea water. I put the crabs to sleep on ice or in the freezer, prepeel off the back, degutt and clean them out, bring the sea water to a boil then put the crabs in the pot for 7 minutes. Take them out of the pot and cool them in running cold water straight away, as you don't want to over cook your crabs. Serve it on a plate with your favourite summer salad. Delish!!  :)