Winter crabbing

Did a little fishing for Tanner crab.

http://flic.kr/p/dw8uFt

http://flic.kr/p/dwhwLj

Sorry it is in two parts.
I was fishing at about 600 ft. These are actually Bardi. T he Opelio and Bardi are so similar they actually cross to form a hybrid. You can tell a hybrid by the eyes. A hybrid will have one green and one red eye.

SD

Brrrr. Hearty souls there!

Just Alaskans. Doing the thing.

If I waited for nice weather I would never get to use the boat.

SD

Greetings,
Very nice Mr. SD...Thanks

skipperdude said:

Just Alaskans. Doing the thing.

If I waited for nice weather I would never get to use the boat.

SD

Click to expand...

Nice. What is that white stuff on all of the boats??

That my friend is solid sunshine. Where I live it seems to be the forever kind.


Sd

Looks like fun SD and good eating. Alaska for Halibut is on my bucket list.

Very cool, Dude. Thanks for taking us along.

Any time my friend.

It looked a little cold but you have to find the good times when and where ever you can.

A good time was had by all.

Even the young girl who had never tasted any kind of seafood in her young life (Just 19) Said it was the best thing she had ever tasted.

I had the water boiling and ready to go.

Talk about fresh seafood.

Sd

Looks like fun, but the video left me shivering. Bet you the beer was ice-cold.

Cool. From the lack of snow, I can tell this was summertime where you live.

Smack dab in the middle of it.

sd

That was GREAT, Dave! We fish here in the winter, too, but it's nothing like that!! This pic was taken a couple of weeks ago.

Them's some pretty dainty snowflakes you got up there. Down here on BC's north coast the snowflakes get soooo big that when you catch one on your tongue, it doesn't melt, and you have to chew it.

Doesn't anybody up there put winter covers on their boats, or do they hire some kid to do the shovelling?

Well done on the photo's, video & music

Murray

A few people have tried winter covers but there is so much wind it just gets shredded.

Whittier is accessed only by a rail road tunnel with a road bed in it.
It closes at 10:00 pm and opens at 6:00 am.

A boat watch service is required by the harbor. There purpose is to shovel the boats.
Last year there was over 42 feet of snow.

I only run the boat below 20 knts winds. So I get maybe 4 or 5 weekends per winter.

I keep an electric heater running on the boat. Just to keep the chill off.

Sd

Very nice. Thanks for sharing. Makes going out for Dungies in our hard Puget Sound winter seem pretty doable.

Heck yes my friend. Don't let a little winter weather stop you form getting out on the water.

It is a whole different world out there in the winter.

Sd

Dave, thanks for sharing your trip with us. When I was at Elmendorf (70-74) a few of us loaded a boat on the train and took it to Whittier. We headed out east across Prince William Sound and spent four days fishing. Beautiful country you have up there.

We almost missed the train on the return trip. Heading across the sound back to Whittier it started to rain.....HARD. We'd plotted a compass heading so we weren't concerned. We turned on the wipers so we could at least see a little bit and were doing fine until we started to see ice bergs, which we hadn't seen on the way out.

We finally realized that turning on the wipers had locked the compass on the heading it was on and was totally useless. We had no clue where we were until we ran into a fishing boat. We'd strayed many miles north of the entrance to the bay where Whittier is and had to make a quick run south and then up the bay to Whittier. We were the last truck to get on the train before they pulled out.

Good memories from my time in AK.

Back in those days it was the only place in the country that you drove your car onto a flatbed rail car to get to Whittier.

Now you can drive there on the tunnel schedule.

It still closes over night.

You can still miss the opening and have to wait till morning.

sd

Kitimat is up a 60 mile channel from the outer coast, so wind speeds are around half of what you probably get. There are a few shredded tarps over boats here already...ours came with a skookum one

SomeSailor said:

Very nice. Thanks for sharing. Makes going out for Dungies in our hard Puget Sound winter seem pretty doable.

Click to expand...

Recreational crabbing is open in the northern Puget Sound areas through December 31 this year. We've been out a few times so far and hope to some more over the next few weekends. You have to have a supplemental crab card which you can get for free anywhere fishing licenses are sold.

I've got the licenses, and go each year... just been procrastinating with the weather. After seeing what he goes through... I feel guilty for not getting out.

skipperdude said:

Did a little fishing for Tanner crab.

http://flic.kr/p/dw8uFt

http://flic.kr/p/dwhwLj

Sorry it is in two parts.
I was fishing at about 600 ft. These are actually Bardi. T he Opelio and Bardi are so similar they actually cross to form a hybrid. You can tell a hybrid by the eyes. A hybrid will have one green and one red eye.

SD

Click to expand...

That's awesome! Thanks for posting that. Do the hybrids breed themselves? Or are they like Mules, a dead end?

Too cool skipper!

I don't think they are mules but I could be wrong. The book didn't say anything about that.
More than likely no one knows.
I havent seen any in my traps.

SD

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yQyg9wOAKyU&feature=youtube_gdata

More winter crabbing video's

It was cold this day. The crab were freezing and there legs were falling off.
I had a pile of crab legs on the deck. Good eating none the less.

Greetings,
Good stuff Mr. SD but I tried to watch it in stereo and got a crick in my neck. Next time post side by side please.

I don't know what happened there.

I tried to edit the darn thing but no luck.

It was supposed to be only one and no text came up with it.

It was pretty cold out that day.
Some of the crab began loosing there legs.
Froze and snapped right off.
We cooked them up on the way back to the harbor for a light snack.

https://skydrive.live.com/redir?resid=F0920C814488E332!5189&authkey=!AHw8YcKSmO8VU6Y

I have no idea if this will work but it's Just more of me and my crew catching a few crab in Alaska.

I like fresh seafood year round.

SD

Worked great, SD.