I'm from Pennsylvania and it wasn't until I got transplanted down to Maryland -compliments of the U.S. Army- in my early twenties that I learned to appreciate steamed Maryland Blue Crabs. That appreciation quickly progressed into a seasonal love affair with the delectable little darlings. So, for at least fifteen years now I've been indulging every chance I get. The main thing I had to overcome was the fact that picking crabs requires a lot of effort and skill and yields a comparatively small amount of reward for your efforts. But I'm sure any seasoned crab picker will agree that any good crab feast requires lots of crabs as well as lots of good friends and family to share in the fun. Crab picking is a social event; a chance to sit down with friends and family for a few hours and trade stories while your fingers are busy excavating sweet morsels of crab meat from the intricate shell and cartilage crab carcasses. It's definitely not a quick brunch type of meal, but more of an afternoon-long get-together.
For as many crabs as I've eaten, I never had the opportunity to actually go crabbing and catch my meal. We always ordered them steamed from a great little crab joint down the road. But I have a few friends that have gone crabbing on quite a few occasions and I was finally fortunate enough to tag along on one such excursion this past Sunday in Fenwick, Delaware. Friends of ours have beach houses down there and my family is lucky enough to be invited down from time to time for a weekend stay. My friend, Shane, has a brother, Matt, who is quite the crabbing pro and agreed to let me and Shane tag along for a late morning/early afternoon expedition.
NOW, as I understand it, there's two primary ways to catch crabs. The first way is to use a crab "pot" or wire cage filled with bait. The cage is dropped into the water and sits at the bottom waiting for crabs to scurry inside and take the bait. There's usually two entry ways into the cage, but they are one-way entries only; crabs: check in, but they don't check out! After a few hours, the cage is hauled up out of the water and -hopefully- there’s a bunch of big crabs trapped inside waiting for you. The upside to this method of crabbing is, of course, very minimal work for the crabber. You bait your cages, drop your cages, and then come back in a few hours -or the next day- and collect your prizes. The downside to this method is there's a lot of waiting involved before the payoff. And while you're waiting, nothing's stopping an unscrupulous crabber from pulling up your cage and stealing your crabs.
A more hands-on approach to crabbing is through the use of a trotline. A trotline is, quite simply, a long, long piece of rope that has bait attached to it every 24 inches or so and weighted on each end to keep the line resting on the bottom. One of the more popular baits used in trotline crabbing are pieces of chicken neck. They're simply tied snuggly on the line at the desired interval. Then, each end of the line is weighted -we used a length of heavy metal chain and some metal weights- and a buoy is attached (so you can spot the beginning and end of the trotline).
We set out for our trotline crabbing adventure late Sunday morning. According to Matt, conditions were ideal. I know it had something to do with the tides and the wind and the temperature, but don't ask me precisely why conditions were "ideal" - I just know from the pro that they were. We boarded our boat "THE CRABMASTER", which was nothing more than a small four-seater aluminum fishing boat with a small Yamaha motor hung off the back, and set out on our 3-mile journey to "the spot" where hopefully a bunch of big, fat, hungry crabs were waiting for us. On board we had a bucket with a 1,000 foot of pre-baited trotline, two nets, and a big battered plastic tub in which the captured crabs would be kept. We, of course, also had the requisite safety gear (life preservers and vests as well as a trusty whistle!) in case we happened to be inspected by any police patrolling the water.
Once we arrived at "the spot", Matt eyed out a straight line course upon which the trotline would be laid and then started setting the line. The trotline began with two metal weights followed by a length of rope with a white buoy attached. After that, there was a, length of heavy chain and then the actual trotline. Matt maneuvered the boat in a slow straight path while carefully dropping the baited trotline. Once the entire line was dropped (set), we found ourselves at the other end with another weight and another white buoy. Now it was time to see if there were any hungry crabs nibbling on our line.
Matt drove the boat all the way back to the first white buoy, which was the marker for the beginning of the trotline. He then hooked up an ingenious PVC pipe attachment to the back of the boat. The best way I can describe it is a sideways "F" - looked sorta like this:
|__|___
Matt picked up the beginning of the trotline (the chain) and fed it through the PVC pipe holder and slowly proceeded forward. The clank-clank-clank-clank of the chain length soon fell silent as the actual trotline started to feed through. Now this PVC pipe contraption was so ingenious to me because it not only kept the line on track, but it also served to knock off any small crabs (not big enough to catch) before the line was returned to the water and its resting place on the bottom. The groove was big enough -and the PVC pipe rounded enough- to easily let the bait pass through without tugging or snagging the entire trotline and it enabled Matt to use his hands for more important things -like steering the boat and snatching catch-worthy crabs from the trotline ascending from the water in front of him. It obviously took a lot of skill and coordination on Matt's part. Somehow he managed to steer the boat, running it at just the right speed, while holding a wire net with his other hand and snatching up crabs from the ascending trotline -without getting caught up in the moving line- and slamming the crabs down into the big plastic bin in one fell swoop. It was amazing to watch him work and a little scary to see that net slamming down in front of me with a panicked crab flailing around. On our first run through the line, we (Matt) probably netted a little over a dozen nice-sized crabs. Once we reached the end of the line, we'd turn around and head back towards the beginning and do the whole maneuver again.
The crabs were none too happy about being snatched up and hurled into a plastic bin with dozens of other prisoners. And a few of them angrily lunged at anything that got too close. Unfortunately for me, that happened to be my hand at one point. I was actually being a merciful captor by pouring some water over the prisoners but I got down in bin too far while pouring the water and, like lightening, BAM! A crab in the corner lunged at my hand, claws snapping, and he managed to latch on to my middle finger. It felt like the tip of my finger had just been hit square with a big heavy hammer. The pain was instant and intense and I instantly shot up to a standing position in the boat while I yanked back my wounded right hand. The angry crab held on tight for a moment and then fell off back into the boat causing all of us to scramble and get our exposed bare feet and legs to higher ground. Shane finally managed to grab the rebellious crustacean with some metal tongs and fling him back into his holding bin.
By the time I finally got a good look at my finger, it was bleeding pretty nicely. The crab had managed to snap his claw closed on my finger top-to-bottom. In other words, the top part of his claw punctured my finger nail while the bottom sunk into flesh on the other side. I was amazed at the force of the blow -enough to go through my finger nail! So now I had a battle scar to show my family when I got back to shore. I was hoping for sympathy, but fully expected the laughter I ended up getting.
In a little under three hours we had made a dozen or so "runs" on the line and netted a good sized bushel of crabs. Some runs only netted one or two edible-sized crabs while other runs yielded more than a dozen. In the process, the three of us traded dirty jokes and funny stories and had some real quality male bonding time. Sure, Matt did all the hard work while Shane and I just watched, but you could tell he really enjoyed crabbing and he enjoyed it even more when he had some company on the boat -which Shane and I were happy to provide.
Of course, the most gratifying part of the whole experience was getting back to shore and throwing them crabbies in a huge pot with some vinegar, beer, and spices and steaming them to perfection. I made sure to identify the little bastard that attacked me on the boat and, after he was steamed, I began my feast with him, starting with his menacing claws.
So now I can say I've gotten the full crab experience and I feel like a more well-rounded crab aficionado because of it. I hope to have the chance to go crabbing with Matt one more time before the summer ends and, this time, I might even try my hand at actually netting some crabs. If I do, the odds are very much in favor of me ending up in the water. I can see that already.
