HMB Crabbing Friday 1/17/14

Any results? Hope to hear about heavy pots. Wish I could of made it today. Would love to learn more from the Master of Half Moon Bay.

Man, the ocean was beautiful today.  The crabbing?  Well, we had to work for it, but I finally eeked out a limit, and Tong and Michael got 9 each.  Launched a 9AM.  The crab were not showing hard.  Picked one here, one there.   Just couldn't find a good concentration of them, and kept spreading the pots in hope of finding one.  By 12:45 I only had 6 and 1/2 of those were just clickers.  There are A LOT more shorts and females in right now.  In fact, some of the females are huge.  I measured one at 6 3/4 and 2 others over 6.  Rebaited the pots with everything I had and waited for 45 minutes.  Bingo, pulled 6 in that string.  Woohoo!  I'm going home with limits.

-Alen

There are A LOT more shorts ...

this is a good great sign for next year!

glad you finished strong!!!

There are A LOT more shorts ...

this is a good great sign for next year!

glad you finished strong!!!

Sorry, everything is relative.  There are a lot more shorts than earlier in the season.  There are a lot less shorts than last season.   

-Allen

Nice going on the dungies fellas.

Jedmo

It was definitely a beautiful day, super companies (we also met Carol/Tocame on the beach), great tasting crabs, and quite a workout. As this was my first crabbing and second kayaking experience, I did not have any expectation to start with, and I could not be more happy with nine dungies. Most importantly, learning something new and cool  like this is just priceless, thank you very much Allen for showing us everything. Allen even corrected my paddle holding, as I was holding the paddle upside down, no wounder it felt strange to start with . Oh, Allen also gave me two large rock crabs, so I actually took home 11 crabs. My family all think the rock crabs taste better than the dungies, and after tasting it, I almost agreed with them.

It was great meeting you Michael and Carol! 

Man, the ocean was beautiful today.  The crabbing?  Well, we had to work for it, but I finally eeked out a limit, and Tong and Michael got 9 each.  Launched a 9AM.  The crab were not showing hard.  Picked one here, one there.   Just couldn't find a good concentration of them, and kept spreading the pots in hope of finding one.  By 12:45 I only had 6 and 1/2 of those were just clickers.  There are A LOT more shorts and females in right now.  In fact, some of the females are huge.  I measured one at 6 3/4 and 2 others over 6.  Rebaited the pots with everything I had and waited for 45 minutes.  Bingo, pulled 6 in that string.  Woohoo!  I'm going home with limits.

-Allen

Glad you made your limits Allen.  How many traps do you set and what kind?  What do you use for bait?

Very nice....wish I could have made it out there today.....but I couldn't be caught dead fraternizing with the enemy 

Until after Sunday that is 

Very cool of you to show the rookies how its done.

Allen even corrected my paddle holding, as I was holding the paddle upside down

  He did the same thing to me.

What you guys learned today is priceless information.

Thanks brother for doing what you do

Glad you made your limits Allen.  How many traps do you set and what kind?  What do you use for bait?

I was running 4 pots and 2 conical  hoops today.  You really want to know what kind?  You asked for it. 1 Danielson, 1 Danielson knockoff, 1 Promar 102, 1 Promar 632, 1 Promar Eclipse, 1 Promar Ambush.  Yup 6 different types.

So do you really want to know what I was running for bait?  It was a freezer clearing exercise today.  Tuna heads/carcs, trout head/carcs, mackeral, squid, ab guts, rockfishing carcs, ling carcs, chicken fat.  Yup, a smorgasborg today.  The trout, mackeral, ab, chicken fat, and squid were all cut and mixed up and run in jars.  Tuna, rockfish, and ling heads/carcs in the cages.  I probably forgot something as there were some unidentifiable bags.

Aren't you glad you asked?   

-Allen

Had a good time out there today at half moon bay. I ended up with eight dungies. Didn't get out of the water till about 4pm. It was nice making some new friends out there. Good group of guys.  Allen, Tonggao and oh course Da Bruddah.   

Hi NCKA Bruddahs,

Yesterday at HMB was awesome. Gentle breezes, glassy ocean with very little current and warm weather like early Fall September Bay Area weather in the 70's.

Mahalo (Thanks)  to Bruddah Allen for showing Tong and I the ropes and great to meet you Tocame. That's some rig you have that Adventure Island. Looks like it can haul ass when there's wind.

Out in the ocean, gentle breezes, glassy ocean with good new friends and some Dungees to take home. My mind relaxed, my body and spirit nourished.

Bruddah Alan, thanks for the extra bait and for lending me a trap. I had no idea how much bait you need for crabbing. Those Dungees really chow down.  Next time I wil defintely bring more.

We are so lucky to be able to be in beautiful ocean with not too much effort.

Took this pic of the Dungees in our kitchen sink right after I got home.

Mahalo nui loa (Thank you very much),

Michael (Da Bruddah)

Right on!

Good to hear, it sound like it is getting better.

Thanks for posting,

Tsuri

Good to hear, it sound like it is getting better.

Quite the contrary, this is the slowest day I've had all season and the smallest grade too, and not only small, but many missing digits, and some not so clean crab.  What causes them to get those black mottled areas? 

-Allen

Yesterdays crabbing(Saturday) was paddle-pull, paddle-pull, paddle-pull.  I couldn't even eat a sandwich like the Islander sailing by.
It was the best workout I've had in ages, so I'm going back tomorrow.
Happy MLk Day!
Craigsf
Hey Mdoka Matt, Thanks for the bait.  Great meeting you and Eric.

Yesterdays crabbing(Saturday) was paddle-pull, paddle-pull, paddle-pull.  I couldn't even eat a sandwich like the Islander sailing by.
It was the best workout I've had in ages, so I'm going back tomorrow.
Happy MLk Day!
Craigsf
Hey Mdoka Matt, Thanks for the bait.  Great meeting you and Eric.

It was a pleasure. How many did you end up with? Eric and I went home with 9 crabs using 4 hoop nets, and like Allen said, they were kinda ugly: missing legs, cracks, ect. Still taste good though. Good luck tomorrow.