BLACKWALL REACH BLUE SWIMMER CRABS

Blackwall Reach, Bicton

 



 

Blackwall reach is a hidden Jewel spot for crabbing. The bushland and cliffs that surrounds you and the peacefulness makes you feel one with nature. We decided to head down there at 6pm for some night time crabbing. Upon arrival we noticed lot's of scuba diver groups heading out for a night time dive and some local Anglers. We set up the crab nets on the jetty and threw them out. The bait I used was chicken drumsticks tied down with a clip. The wait was on, an hour into crabbing and we had caught nothing. Meanwhile a scuba diving team were heading in and they had caught some monster sized crabs, so I knew at that they were definately there. After relocating to another spot on the jetty we decided to launch the crab nets out further and much to my excitement this time we were lucky, 2 female bumper sized crabs. All up I was pretty impressed with our catch. I had hoped to stay longer but our crabbing venture was cut short, my friend was getting eaten alive by mozzies and I was beginning to feel sorry for her :) yes we had indeed forgotten to pack the mozzy repellant. I presprayed before leaving however failed to mention that there would be mozzies where we were going to my poor friend :). So we decided to call it a night and head back to her place. My friend placed the crabs in the freezer and we sat down for a nice cuppa coffee. After about an hour we decided it was time to cook up the crabs. I opened the fridge to find no crabs. It was when I opened the freezer did I realise she had placed it accidently in the freezer and the crabs were frozen stiff....It's claws had launched onto the railing and it was indeed stuck. After much laughing and many attempts to pull the crab from the railing, We finally had to cut the claws to free the big buggar for tea :). So my big tip here is if you decided to put your crabs to sleep in the freezer put them in there for a short period of time as you don't want to spend another hour trying to defrost your crabs.   :)   

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!!  :)