Crabbing in Bodega Harbor or Tomales Bay?

I was thinking that since Dungeness season is opening up soon, crabbing in Bodega Harbor or Tomales Bay might be a possibility when the open ocean is too rough to go out on.  I have heard of dungeness being caught in both of these places but have never done so myself.  Is the mercury a problem in crabs out of Tomales Bay?  Are there places that I could drop my traps inside bodega harbor that are safe from boat traffic and productive?  I am itching to get out there and drop my hoop nets off of my kayak for the first time.  
Travis

If you go to Bodega Harbor you can also fish along the jetties for rockfish and lings. If the swells are too big then it most likely means that there will not be too much traffic as the boats will not go out the harbor.

There are a lot of people that drop crab nets all over there. And there are SUPPOSEDLY halibut in there....Never seen one, but heard others caught them. The rockfish along the jetty and the lings I have seen.

As for Tomales, I eat a lot of oysters out of there each year so if there are dungies in there Id say they might be safe. I have only seen the warnings on the park signs for the eating of sharks.

I just looked on DFGs website and it says they reccomend eating rock crab out of tomales bay no more than 3 times a week for a man. It doesn't say anything about dungeness but I am thinking it would be the same.  I don't plan on eating it more than 3 times a week anyways.

Travis when are you thinking about heading over there?

Travis when are you thinking about heading over there?

 I was thinking about this weekend.  I was planning on going diving but it looks like it will be too rough for that.  I don't know for sure yet though.

http://www.fishsniffer.com/cgi-bin/forumsyabb/YaBB.pl?board=west;action=display;num=1127924589;start=0#0

Check this out Travis. Lotta good stuff here.

whoops that was me.....

anyone got a picture of their yak filled with hoop nets and crab traps?  I can't imagine there would be enough room to store that stuff.  How do you pack it all on there?  

anyone got a picture of their yak filled with hoop nets and crab traps?  I can't imagine there would be enough room to store that stuff.  How do you pack it all on there?  

posted by ChuckE............

http://www.norcalkayakanglers.com/content/view/22/42/1/1/

I tried crabbing Tomales last year in my kayak. I set one crab trap on two different occasions and all I got is red rock crab. I tried on both sides of Hogg Island. Maybe if you set in the deep part of the channel there, you might find dungeness.

Another trick is to try and have a trap out when there a storm and a big sea. I have had excellent luck in Nehalem Bay in Oregon when this happens. I caught huge crabs up to nine inches and the Bay typically produces 6 inchers.

Has anyone seen any big dungeness come out of bodega harbor itself?  I had someone tell me once that they caught numerous dungeness off of one of the old piers in the harbor.

Yup, there's definitely crabs inside the harbor. Mostly HUGE red and brown rock crabs, but there is an occasional keeper dungee caught in there.

My boy Monte and I got these off of the Doran Jetty on Xmas Eve '03.