"Short Wave Sportfishing" wrote in message
...
On Mon, 08 Nov 2004 05:50:26 GMT, "Calif Bill"
wrote:

As you boating wantabees argued politics. I took the boat out for a day
on
the salt. Opening day of Dungeness Crab season. Normally we get really
nasty weather and lose at least a week of our sport season before the
commercials get to drop their thousands of pots 2 weeks after we do. But
weather was beautiful, but big swell. About an 10-12' swell, but long
period and no wind. Ran 28-30 out to the area where I dropped my first
couple of pots. 70' and then dropped the next 3 at 100'. the 100'
string
had one rock crab, no dungees. The 70' string gave me 8 legal crabs
(limit
10). The people who dumped in 150' of water had to throw back extras as
the
pots were stuffed. I guess the swell moved the crabs out to deeper
water.
Came back to a great party on a friends 34' Luhrs where they boiled up a
bunch of crabs, ate sourdough bread and beverages of choice. Only
drawback
to the day. Had a flat on the trailer, must have been only a couple of
miles from the harbor as did not notice any problem. 3/4 T Chevy diesel
crewcab does pull nice. Tire was ruined, and spare was low on air.
Launched and changed tire and took to service station to fill it up after
crabbing. My pots were not touched but the last couple of years, there
has
been a lot of people poaching from others pots. And they do not even
rebait
after stealing the crabs! So my crab only costs $xxx a pound. Cheaper
to
buy at the store. But was great to be out on the boat.

Nice day. Unfortunately, the Contender is out of the water, but I'm
holding my Ranger back from winterizing until December just in case
there is a good day so I can run out and do some black fishing.

I saw a show on Discovery channel last week about the West Coast
crabbing industry - man, that was really interesting.

These Dungeness Crabs are cousins to the King Crab yes?

Out of curiosity, how big it your boat?

All the best,

Tom
--------------

"What the hell's the deal with this newsgroup...
is there a computer terminal in the day room of
some looney bin somewhere?"

Bilgeman - circa 2004

Dungies are only related to king crab in that they are crabs. They taste
better than Kings but are a lot smaller. Minimum size for sport is 5 3/4"
across the back and for commercial 5 1/4. I run a 21' boat. Jetcraft
Bluewater. Is a higher side, pointy front version of the aluminum
whitewater river boats. 351 Ford driving a Kodiak Jetpump. And a Yamaha
T-8 kicker. Alumimum is 0.190 thick.
Bill