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Thread: Crawfish

  1. #21

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    I forgot one cooking tip, you see that collapsing bucket in the pic above?

    I fill it with salted water and live craws, the salt makes them puke up the nasty stuff inside them, some folks say to do that multiple times, when I do it, I only do it once and it does make a difference. I can see yuckie coloring in the water after a few minutes.

    These are clean mountain craws I catch, maybe muddy swamp craws should get multiple salt baths.





    Seafood cravings all of a sudden here...


  2. #22
    Senior Member flandersander's Avatar
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    Me and my dad caught the second largest crawfish ever caught. At 4lbs 6oz it made a great supper. we were recognized by guiness but never aired for some reason.

  3. #23
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    I have a small muddy pond that is absolutely full of them. I always sein it for bait before catfishing, can usually pull about 300-500 crawdads out in one pass using a two man net. They are pretty small but are great for bait. When one of my friends and I run a trot line in the river for catfish, we usually have about 200 hooks in the water, so it comes in handy to beable to catch that much bait that fast.

  4. #24
    Administrator Rick's Avatar
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    Hey Flandersander. A 4lb. craw? You sure that wasn't Guinness Stout? (chuckle, chuckle, chuckle.)
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  5. #25

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    Me and my cousins used to catch buckets of those things up in Wisconsion. They are quite fast if I remember correctly, so it takes a bit of practice to catch them. The method we used was a slow methodical approach with a big bucket slowly inserted into the water behind them, when they get spooked they would shoot backwards in a hurry, once we figured that out we were good.

  6. #26
    Senior Member flandersander's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Rick View Post
    Hey Flandersander. A 4lb. craw? You sure that wasn't Guinness Stout? (chuckle, chuckle, chuckle.)
    I'm sure. After i posted that my dad said that he never was on camera, he only talked to a guy at guiness. Yeah 4 lbs. I know its amazing. We never trapped it though. We were icefishing and were using munnow for bait. A craw came by and ate the minnow with a J-hook burried in it. We thought it was a walleye but it turned out to be a huge craw! It was a great day!

  7. #27
    Senior Member flandersander's Avatar
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    How do you go about catching 'em without a trap or bucket or anything? Anybody know?

  8. #28
    Senior Member RBB's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by flandersander View Post
    How do you go about catching 'em without a trap or bucket or anything? Anybody know?
    Turn over rocks until you find one. Stand beside them, have one hand in front of them (to get them to move) and the other hand in back of them to grab them when they move (they go backwards when startled). One local lake, you step in the water, you'll startle a dozen of them with each step.

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    Last edited by RBB; 01-12-2008 at 07:05 AM.
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  9. #29
    Administrator Rick's Avatar
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    Man, that does look good.
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  10. #30

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    I was lucky enough to live in Southern Louisiana for a few years and got addicted to crawfish. It's not just a survival food, for me. I'd love a plate right now!

    Easy to catch, easy to cook and tasty. Perfect! If I had a good area to catch crawfish, I'd hide the survival mirror and try to hang out a few more days there

  11. #31
    A Laughing Wolf spiritman's Avatar
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    MMMMM! Dinner time!

  12. #32
    Senior Member corndog-44's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by RBB View Post
    Turn over rocks until you find one. Stand beside them, have one hand in front of them (to get them to move) and the other hand in back of them to grab them when they move (they go backwards when startled). One local lake, you step in the water, you'll startle a dozen of them with each step.

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    RBB, what is everybody else having for dinner?

  13. #33
    Senior Member flandersander's Avatar
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    So just go to some lake where you can find craw shels on shore. Then start turning over rocks and when you find one, grab it by the tail???

  14. #34

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    Catching them without a bucket? I was instructed to tie a chicken neck or other piece of "bad meat" to a string. You throw it into the water and let it sit for 2-3 minutes, maybe 5. Slowly pull the string in to shore, stopping every few seconds, and the crawfish follow. Drag them right into the shallows and grab them with your hand. Reach behind them because as they get scared, they will swim backwards.

    Buckets? We don't need no stinking buckets!

    The buckets and pots do help to catch larger numbers, but sometimes I've drug a line with 3-4 crawfish following. I only grabbed one and scared the others, though.

  15. #35
    Senior Member RBB's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by corndog-44 View Post
    RBB, what is everybody else having for dinner?
    If you really must know -

    We had two seven pound venison roasts, slow cooked over an open fire, corn on the cob, and fry bread. The crayfish shown are about 1/10th of our haul that day. The only kettle free was only large enough to cook the amount of crayfish shown at one time.
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  16. #36
    Senior Member RBB's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by flandersander View Post
    So just go to some lake where you can find craw shels on shore. Then start turning over rocks and when you find one, grab it by the tail???

    Well, not quite. Use the hand in front of them to distract them, when they take off backwards, just grab them. You have to be quick. Takes a little practise.
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  17. #37
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    Just about every creek and and lake around here harbors the Rusty Crawfish. They get pretty big so a few can make a nice meal. Here's a .pdf about them and where they live.

    http://www.in.gov/dnr/invasivespecie...20CRAYFISH.pdf

    If you don't have a trap and want to catch several in short order then find a shallow stream. Do as RBB said although there is a pretty good chance you won't have to turn over many rocks. You'll be able see them just walking through the stream. The big guys will hide on you though. On land, crawdads built a tubular hole that sort of resembles a little volcano. They build them in low lying areas where the water table is low and often close to some source of water and that could even be a ditch of some sort. I've always been told you can use AD's method above and drop the bait down the hole but I've never had any luck with that method.

    If you use your hands to catch them you want to stay clear of the pinchers. They will hurt!
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  18. #38
    Senior Member flandersander's Avatar
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    i was planning on building a trap. Any ideas or recomendations on traps? Also i have a trap like this http://www.frabill.com/frabill/image...260_medium.png Will it work for catching craws?

  19. #39
    reclinite automaton canid's Avatar
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    it could. the best advice i ever got on trapping crawfish was online from a man who is purported to fish them commercialy in eastern oregon. he said to give them some cover on top of a dark colored material [i'm using dark plastic mesh like the stuff orrange bags are made from. this is allegedly more attractive to investigating crawfish, as it's dark inside, like a rock crevice, under a submerged log, etc. seems to make a difference.
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  20. #40
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    To catch em, just lift up rocks and logs, they love to bury themselves, be sure not to roll the rock so you dont squish them, and try to disurb the bottom minimally because it will get all cloudy and they will scatter and you wont see them, they move fast. when you see one, just snatch it with five fingers then grab it with two fingers on the shell behind the claws. you can just put them in your pocket if you dont have a bucket. Other than for food, they are a favorite among bass, I've seen times where a bass would take nothing but a live craw.
    flandersander,4 lb craw? awesome.

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