Fishing Charlotte Harbor Area (Cape Coral, Largo: for sale, co-op, credit)

[Big House]

Originally Posted by Foxrivman1

Messing About how big are the crabs, sound like nice eating size, ever tried a crab net off your dock with a old fish head tied to it?? We did that on vacation a couple of times and it worked well.

In MD they crab with chicken necks, and other parts. Crabs will eat just about anything!

[SoFLGal]

Yeah you can use a dip net, bucket and chicken neck and catch them right off the beach. Mostly at night. Or you can throw some meat in a trap off most and docks and get 'em as well.

I used to do a lot of crabbing and shrimping off the beaches and local piers when I was a kid. The Tom Adams Bridge in Englewood is pretty good for catching shrimp at night when the tide is changing.

[Messing About]

We use a crab pot off our back yard dock and load it with left over bait. My son also caught a couple on his rod/reel. One bit live shrimp and one bit a pin fish.

[Foxrivman1]

Messing About, did you cook the crabs right after you caught them?

[Foxrivman1]

SoFLGal what did you catch the shrimp with? Method, etc.

[SoFLGal]

Originally Posted by Foxrivman1

SoFLGal what did you catch the shrimp with? Method, etc.

Fox-We would hang out under the bridge and have a long dip net and QBeam light. You just shine the light in the water and you can see the red glowing eyes of the shrimp. You just scoop them right up.

Messing About-Nice Blues! Really you can put just about anything in the trap. Often we would use fish heads and guts from the fish we cleaned for the day. Chicken or whatever kind of meat works too. Crabs are scavengers.

We'd also get the occasional stone crab. With those you just take one claw and throw them back. Then off the beach you can get blues and rooster crabs as well.

[Foxrivman1]

SoFLGal, I take it the stone crabs grow the claw back, is that right?

[SoFLGal]

Originally Posted by Foxrivman1

SoFLGal, I take it the stone crabs grow the claw back, is that right?

Yeah that's right. They do grow the claws back.

[Messing About]

Oh wow, I'd go crazy if I caught my own stone crabs! I ate those claws at Cabbage Key with a good friend who just passed last weekend (God rest his soul) and we paid $24 a pound!

Yes Riv, we steamed them alive. It was quite the comedy of errors in our kitchen when one of them got loose on our countertop and backed himself into a corner against the knife block. I hollered out, "He's going for the knives, look out!" We all laughed so hard we almost peed ourselves. LMFAO. What a great time we had with my son.

[Foxrivman1]

That is comic MA! You should have video taped that for the Worlds Funniest Videos show, you probably would at least had a shot at the 10k prize!