CrabbingInTheHood.com

During an upcoming public meeting scheduled for Feb. 4 thru 6 in Olympia, the Washington Fish and Wildlife Commission will consider adopting a new package of sportfishing rules for 2010-12, as well as updates to the Columbia River sturgeon management policy.

Of particular interest is a proposed change to the Dungeness Crab Season and Daily Limit. This past year when the season opened, recreational crabbing was allowed each week from Wednesday through Saturday, with a legal limit of 5 per day, per licensed person. The newly proposed rules would change the allowable days for crabbing to Friday through Monday, and reduce the legal limit down to 4 per day, per licensed person.

While the day changes are certainly welcome, it’s hard to swallow (or maybe I should say ‘not’ to swallow) the reduction in daily limits. This is the second time in recent years that the limit amount has been lowered.

The commission, a nine-member citizen panel appointed by the governor to set policy for the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife (WDFW), will convene for its regular meeting Feb. 5-6 in Room 172 of the Natural Resources Building, 1111 Washington St. S.E. The meeting is scheduled to begin at 8:30 a.m. both days.

For more information, go to WA Dept of Fish & Wildlife

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Rich Jacobson is a licensed real estate professional providing knowledgeable empowerment and relentless representation for his clients of residential properties and vacant land throughout all of Kitsap County WA and portions of Pierce, Mason, and Jefferson Counties. You can also find him at KitsapLife.com, SOUNDBITEBLOG, ActiveRain, Everyday CK, Facebook, Twitter, or e-mail:  kitsapagent@gmail.com

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Well, July 29th couldn’t come any faster to the Jacobson household. That was the day that the recreational crabbing season for Marine Zone 12 (Hood Canal) officially opened!

Our first pull of the season made the nearly month long delay well worth the wait. Our first pot yielded 8 exceptionally large keepers. Several were off the gauge, measuring over 8 inches in body shell span. We easily limited out at 15 and actually had to throw a couple smaller males back to remain within legal catch limits.

The second week proved almost as productive, catching 8 one day and 11 the next.

With the WA Dept. of Fish & Wildlife extending the current  season out until January 2, 2010, our mounting freezer stockpile  is guaranteed to keep us crab happy during the off-season.

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Rich Jacobson is a licensed real estate professional providing knowledgeable empowerment and relentless representation for his clients of residential properties and vacant land throughout all of Kitsap County WA and portions of Pierce, Mason, and Jefferson Counties. You can also find him at KitsapLife.com and SOUNDBITEBLOG, or e-mail:  kitsapagent@gmail.com

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In years past, you had several local options on where you could purchase your crabbing gear supplies.

When we first moved here to Silverdale WA, I found some great bargains at a Pawn Shop over in downtown Poulsbo, just down from JJ’s Fish Restaurant. Unfortunately, they went out of business a few years back.

Kitsap Sports (just behind Macy’s Furniture store and Home Depot) has historically maintained a somewhat limited inventory, with typically higher prices.

Big Five Sports (located in the strip mall with Arby’s and Emerald City Smoothie) is known for their bargain prices, but their inventory of crabbing gear is extremely minimal.

As I had reported previously, in the face of bankruptcy proceedings, our local Sportsman Warehouse was recently purchased by UFA Cooperative Ltd., a company based out of Calgary, Canada, which currently operates 35 farm and ranch stores, 7 sporting goods stores, and 120 gas stations, mostly in western Canada. They operate under the name of Wholesale Sports.

I took a brief visit to Wholesale Sports here in Silverdale the other day (just one block east of Costco) and was pleasantly surprised to find an even greater selection of products than what had been previously inventoried by Sportsman’s Warehouse.

They carry the full range of Danielson products, including the most popular inexpensive collapsible crab trap for under $25.  You can outfit a complete crabbing rig for about $75 – which would include the trap, buoy kit w/ 100 ft. of poly rope, bait cage, weight kit, and 4-point harness kit.

The low end Danielson collapsible trap will usually last approximately 3 seasons, but Wholesale Sports also offers several other brands/styles that are more durable and naturally more expensive.

With the recreational crabbing season quickly approaching here in the Puget Sound, I would highly recommend a visit to Wholesale Sports in Silverdale WA, and stock up on all your crabbing gear needs!

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Okay, so you’re probably as bummed out as me from the news that Hood Canal (Marine Area 12) isn’t scheduled to open for recreational crabbing until July 29th!

You heard it right, July 29th! That’s nearly two-thirds of your prime warm Summer crabbing weather gone down the tubes, leaving only a few short weeks in August to make a mad scramble for those coveted Dungies!

So what are your options, you ask?

Well, starting as early as June 18th, you could trailer your boat up to Neah Bay/Seiku (Marine Area 4 & 5), on the northernmost point of the Olympic Peninsula. Don’t forget that the Hood Canal Bridge might still be closed, so you’ll have to drive around through Shelton! And while you’re at it, remember its open water up there, so that 12 ft. aluminum boat with a 5 hp. kicker just ain’t gonna cut it!

Or, you could trailer your boat down to Marine Area 13 (South Puget Sound), down around Olympia. But they haven’t seen any dungies in those parts since Lewis & Clark came through!

So that leaves you with Marine Area 10 (Seattle/Bremerton) that opens on July 1st. We normally launch at Brownsville Marina and motor out through Agate Pass, and drop our pots off Suquamish Harbor. It costs you a couple bucks to launch at Brownsville, but they have a nice ramp and dock.

There is always the Charles Lawrence Memorial Boat Ramp in downtown Suquamish as well, which is suitable for small-to-medium sized boats.

Of course, you could always just run out to one of the local tribal fisheries and pay $6.99 per pound. They’ve got plenty, all year round!…

For a list of all WA State Park boat launch locations, go HERE.

For the list of all Kitsap County WA boat launch locations, go HERE.

For the Kitsap Peninsula Visitors & Convention Bureau website, go HERE.

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Rich Jacobson is a licensed real estate professional providing knowledgeable empowerment and relentless representation for his clients of residential properties and vacant land throughout all of Kitsap County WA and portions of Pierce, Mason, and Jefferson Counties. You can also find him at KitsapLife.com and SOUNDBITEBLOG, or e-mail:  kitsapagent@gmail.com

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One of the best things I enjoy about living  out on the beautiful Kitsap Peninsula here in scenic Washington State, is taking my 16 ft. C-Dory out on the Hood Canal, part of the extensive inland waterways of Puget Sound. The Hood Canal is a long, deep, narrow strip of water wedged in between the Kitsap Peninsula and the picturesque Olympic Peninsula. The Olympic Mountain Range rises up rather dramatically from the edge of the water. The scenery is absolutely breathtaking.!

One of the many benefits of boating on the Hood Canal is recreational crabbing. The Dungeness Crab is the prized catch in these waters. The season typically opens the first week of July and runs through Labor Day weekend. The Washington Department of Fish & Game is extremely active in monitoring sports fishing in our state, so you better be in compliance with all current rules and regulations! (WA Dept. of Fish & Wildlife)

We launch our boat out at Miami Beach in Seabeck WA. We learned through experience to be mindful of the tide schedule. If you go out too close to low tide, you will have a rough time getting your boat down the ramp. So we usually launch an hour or two before the peak of high tide. (WA Tide Schedules)

Once on the water, we head over towards Dabob Bay, just around the Toandoes Peninsula, and prepare to lower our crab pots. You can purchase crabbing gear from the Sportsman Warehouse in Silverdale. You can figure on spending a minimum of $80 per rig, including the crap pot (cage), buoy & flag, 100′ of weighted line, bait box, and weights. Being bottom-dwellers, crabs will eat just about anything, but they seem to be partial to salmon guts. Several of our area supermarkets (Silverdale Red Apple Market and Central Market in Poulsbo WA) save the guts when they clean the fish, and sell them for crab bait.

We lower the crab pots (usually in about 60 to 100 feet of water) and then head over to Pleasant Harbor, a quaint little port nestled on the Olympic side. They have a convenience store, pizza parlor, and deck overlooking the harbor. We’ll grab some cold drinks, pork-out on pizza, and catch some rays as we wait a couple hours in hopeful expectation that our pots will fill up.

We head back and pull up our crab pots, carefully extracting the prized booty. We prefer to clean the crabs while we’re out on the water. It makes for less clean-up later and allows you to put more edible crab into the pot when cooking. We also bring salt water back with us, to use for boiling the crab in. Some people prefer to use fresh water and add a crab boil spice pouch. I have found that boiling the crab in saltwater gives it a really great natural flavor. There is a difference of opinion on how long to boil the crab. I have found that 12 to 15 minutes after reaching boiling point is more than enough time. I’ll drain the water, and put the crab into a big stainless bowl, covering it with ice to cool it quickly. Some people like to dip their crab in melted butter, but I prefer to eat it right out of the shell.

There are few things better in life than spending a few relaxing hours out on the Hood Canal, bringing home some fresh crab, and porking out!

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Rich Jacobson is a licensed real estate professional providing empowerment and relentless representation for his clients of residential properties and vacant land throughout all of Kitsap County WA and portions of Pierce, Mason, and Jefferson Counties. You can also find him at KitsapLife.com, and SOUNDBITEBLOG.

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