Friday 30 Jan, Fort Point

Another beautiful day, and as I'm still gainfully unemployed, I drove up to SF to try my luck crabbing at Torpedo Pier. I arrived fairly late, around 1 pm, set up my traps, with chicken carcasses spiced up with a little dried anchovy/squid. The traps were fairly quickly attacked, with a nice rock crab as soon as I had returned from the bathroom. Normally I'd throw these back when just over legal size, and especially when female, but it was heavy for its size, and it was the first of the day, so I put it in my bucket to keep me company until I caught something larger. Some passing german tourists looked like they needed camera subjects, so I gave them a starfish which kept them happy snapping for a while, and a brief play with my new found rock friend.

Strangely, there were only a couple of other lines in the water, and for once, the sealions werent patrolling. By the end of the day (4 pm), I had 2 more crabs, 5" red crabs, and had thrown back 2 legal sized Dungeness, as these are illegal inside the bridge. One was lovely and heavy. It was so tempting to shove it under my sweater....

By 4 pm, a sealion was back, and it ripped off my bait cage, a nice dishwasher cage I bought for a buck fifty at goodwill. Bas*ardo! That leaves me with the remains of an old cage on the other trap, which has been through the jaws of other sealions, and is looking decidedly the worse for wear. Anyone know of a Sealion repellent? Reminder to self: Next time, WIRE the cages to the trap; plastic ties arent enough, even 10 of them.

The crabs were all heavy and full when I cooked them; often the rock claws are disappointingly empty and slightly bitter; but this time they were full and sweet. Compared to my Dungeness catch more recently, (which were emaciated), the crabs must have been feeding well lately.