A few plate size sand crabs.

[trandrew]

Oh crabbing is great fun. I caugt a few dozen at lakes entrance also. While i got my hoop nets in i wade around hunting for shore crabs on the rocks. Nipped fingers but all in the fun. I wanted to try crabbing at werribee river off the jetty. I found a claw floating around and get many tiny ones off the barnacles. Anyone got experience in ts location??

[dzulazwan]

Went to lakes entrance and caught some, basically just lettin my kids enjoy da activity.
They had a blast! Learning abt crab and fighting to get a turn to return the smaller crabs.
Is it true that the crabs is bigger during autumn n winter?

[MrI-fish]

Well Rixter, you have done it again. Great informative posts. Now to invest in Hoop net companies before the rush of purchasers hit the stands. Seriously great post and really helpful. Will definitely have a try and add a couple of hoop nets to my regular fishing kit. Have you ever used stewing beef or rump steak tied into the net? It used to work really well for catching yabbies.

[rixter]

Thanks MrI-fish for the nice feedback. .

No doubt stewing beef or rump would work fine , crabs are scavengers and will take pretty much any meat or scraps.

There is also new 'Pyramid' style nets available now. These nests are in the testing mode still and allowed by DEPI ( for now while still in testing ) .
They are almost like a hoop net , except they are square at the bottom, and have a pyramid shape net protruding upwards from the base , the sides only extend about 25 cm up / but they don't collapse like a hoop net does .

The crabs can crawl over the edge of the pyramid wall, but they cant crawl back out; unlike like a hoop net sitting flat/collapsed on the bottom, which the crabs can crawl out again before your retrieve your hoop net .

I'll see if I can find the pics of them and post them up here .

Cheers , Rick.

[rixter]

Went to lakes entrance and caught some, basically just lettin my kids enjoy da activity.
They had a blast! Learning abt crab and fighting to get a turn to return the smaller crabs.
Is it true that the crabs is bigger during autumn n winter?

People may say so , but I've landed big and small crabs all year round , you just have to be lucky on the day and keep at it.
Keep throwing the small ones back and just keep the big ones. Sometimes you can bag out on big ones in an hour max , sometimes it takes all day.

I usually just throw the nets down as a by-catch while I'm fishing away anyway / or throw a few hoop nets into the surf while surf fishing / to keep the crabs away from my fishing rod bait / use them as bait or eat them / better than them stealing your bait .

Cheers , Rick.

[rixter]

Here's a link to a pic of those nets I was on about and some info about them and the rules.
http://www.fishingboating-world.com/Ope ... ria/104038" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

I will add though, I saw this originally just before Christmas on the old DPI website , since it has updated to the DEPI website this year I can't seem to find these nets on here again ,although it mentions nothing about it ( the new DEPI page actually looks like a very old DPI page updated to the new web address ? ) .

So , you may want to check into this a bit more if you are going to purchase and use these nets. Maybe they have banned them again this year ? , but there is no mention of it on the new DEPI website.

Cheers , Rick.

[stona]

hey rick cheers for the great crabbing info.
I went to Sandy point at low tide to have a look and there was no water under the mangrove trees.
Does the tide need to be in far enough so there is some water under the mangroves?
Also will the crabs be walking around under the mangroves or will they be hiding under the sand?
Thanks once again for all the info, my wife loves crabs and ive always wanted to catch some edible sized ones.
cheers, stona

[rixter]

G'day Stona... Sorry I should of been more precise on mentioning the tide height for Sandy point to get crabs. You want a low tide ( but not all the way out so it's just sand ). You want the water lever around the mangroves about 1 foot deep, bit over or under is fine also.
They will be sitting above the sand under the water, right near the bases of the trees.

The water needs to be cool to cold, so don't bother hitting the area on hot days ( like today ), or even getting on days around 26 degrees or over.
Overcast cool days are the best time usually / along with a matching tide.

GL , cheers mate , Rick.

[stona]

Thanks very much for the extra info Rick, truly appreciate it.

I will give it another go once it cools abit.

cheers, stona

[rguez06]

Anyone tried throwing crab pots in Mornington Pier (Schnapper point)?