This past weekend, Janel and I went to the coast to go crabbing. Anna found a nice (and really cheap) house that we rented with Anna, Danny, Michelle, Julien, and Allen in Rockaway Beach (between Seaside and Tillamook).
We ran into some technical difficulties getting started, but had our first crab ring in the water around 1:00pm in Garibaldi. We originally planned to crab up in Nehalem Bay at the Brighton Marina, but they were closed for bad weather.
There were a lot of crab, but you can only keep males whose shells are 5.75" wide. Here is a photo of one of our catches (all of which were too small).
You catch crab by dropping these "rings" into the water. There are two concentric rings -- a small one and a large one -- that are connected with a net. When you pull them up, they create a "truncated cone" which holds the crab. We used chicken legs as bate.
Janel, Julian, Michelle, and I shared a ring and were able to bring in two crabs. The rest of our group did not have any luck. There is not a lot of skill involved in catching crab, and it is really easy to do ... but catching crab that is actually big enough seems like a bit of a crap shoot.
Here is a photo of one of our crabs after we boiled it. Tasty!
Crabbing was a good time, and I think we all plan on going again sometime (but preferably on a day with better weather).
