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The owner of Tillamook Sporting Goods was a
commercial crabber with one of the
best of the best commercial crabber's, namely Homer
Johnson who lived in
Netarts, Oregon (who has since passed on). The
owners of T.S.G. still have Homer
's dory and from time to time go crabbing on Netarts
and Tillamook Bays. At
first blush crabbing seems to be very simple but if
these following simple steps
and guidelines are followed any crabber will
ultimately be considerably more
successful.
(1) Never buy an ungrounded crab trap. Some people
like to use the fold-down
versions which are merely painted and are not
grounded because they are easy to
store in motor homes and R.V.'s and will admittedly
get a few crabs. It should
be pointed out that anything made of iron ferrous
(metal) would oxidize (rust)
and give off an electrical current when it comes in
contact with any salt water.
We know that the bays and ocean contain sodium
chloride, potassium chloride and
other sulfates, sulfites etc. The iron in a metal
crab trap (which has not been
grounded/or poly-coated) gives off an electrical
current that the larger crabs
stay away from. The best crab trap or pot uses
stainless steel on the tops and
bottoms and thusly does not give off any
electrolysis. In addition the
surrounding iron has been coated with a plastic
polymer making it impossible to
give off any current. In addition to that the access
tunnels that are available
for the crab to enter have been grounded and covered
with polymer. There are
some people that prefer to use crab pots or traps in
which the tops and bottoms
have been covered with stainless steel however the
surrounding infrastructure is
made of iron and is merely covered with rubber
tubing (such as the type that is
found on a tire inner tube) this last part is not
acceptable as the rubber does
not hermetically seal the iron and thusly does not
stop the electrolysis and
again gives off a current which the crabs don't
like. Tillamook Sporting Goods
carries Protoco crab pots and rings, which are
totally poly-coated, the tops and
bottoms are covered with stainless steel and the
openings (tunnels) have been
grounded so as to give off no electrical current. We
have found these pots and
rings to be the finest and most successful on the
market today. They fish well!
(2) It is a tragedy that so many pots, traps and
rings are lost in the bays.
This could certainly be avoided if the user would
invest in at least 50 to 60
ft. of rope of no less than ½ inch in diameter. It
has often been said, "well
why should I buy 50 to 60 ft. of rope when I'm only
crabbing in 12 to 15 ft. of
water?" The answer is simple: If you get your pot or
ring sanded in because of
current or weather conditions and if you only have
12 to 15 ft. of rope it's
almost impossible to pull the pot or ring out of the
sand whereas if you have 50
to 60 ft. of rope you merely tie the excess rope to
the back of your boat (the
transom) go out as far as you can, cock your engine
at a slight angle and simply
make wide circles around the pot and we guarantee
you it will screw itself out
of the sand. So many people have invested a lot of
money in crabbing
paraphernalia and slighted themselves on rope only
to lose their pots or rings.
We at Tillamook Sporting Goods sell rope by the
foot; we tie your buoys and
outfit you correctly.
(3) Bait is the most important part of crabbing. It
is commonly known that squid
is one of the best baits one can use for crabbing,
but unfortunately it is very
expensive and the seals and seal lions just love it.
So how does one bait a pot
or ring successfully but still keep the seals or
seal lions away? (Remember
seals and seal lions are capable with their richly
vascularized noses of
smelling bait at great distances, they are
intelligent mammals with large brains
and have been rewarded by getting free meals from
our local crab pots for over
140 years). The way to stop them and still attract
the crab is as follows:
double bait your pots or rings with stainless steel
clips (they are cheap and do
not give off electrolysis) with any of the
following: salmon heads, chad, but
along with it put in a mink carcass. The crabs
dearly love the fish heads or
fish carcasses as well as the mink however; the
seals and seal lions are totally
repelled by the smell of the mink carcass. Many
years ago there were many mink
ranches in the Tillamook valley. Tillamook Sporting
Goods sells bait as well as
mink carcasses. The heads and tails of the mink
carcasses have been removed to
make them more aesthetically pleasing. This double
baiting procedure is one of
the most effective ways to guarantee success in
crabbing.
(4) Before you go crabbing please look closely at
your tide tables. You may pick
up a free tide table or go to tides on this website.
Remember that crabs do not
like high current volumes of water and will sand in
and not feed if confronted
with such a scenario. If you have a high tide
followed by a low tide (a big run
off or minus tide) always place your pots or rings
up the bay away from the
oceanfront. Find the deepest water (which most
always can be done visually as
deep water looks very blue). Crabs also are very
sensitive to atmospheric
changes and if you have a barometer and it's going
down but yet you have enough
time to put the crab pots out before the storm hits
be assured that the crabs
sense this and migrate from the ocean or ocean front
to the deep water up the
bay and begin a feeding frenzy as they instinctively
know that when the storm
hits they will sand in and not feed until the storm
passes. If you have enough
time before a storm and you go up the bay your
chances of success are great.
Tillamook Sporting Goods is a family owned business
and has a staff that are
very knowledge about guns, ammo, black powder,
archery hunting & camping gear,
fishing & bait, RV & marine supplies, clamming &
crabbing supplies, boots,
shoes, clothing, team sports, athletic supplies,
canoes & kayaks and much more.
We are continually updated by the guides in this
area whom we serve. We are here
to give you the straight scope on which rivers are
good, what to use accurately
and honestly. We hope that you contact us either
personally or online.
http://www.tillamooksportinggoods.com/html/crabbing_information.html
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