CRABBIN it up in Murrells Inlet

      Hey Guys! I am coming to you today from Myrtle Beach, SC! I've been in town for a whole week now and I am heading back home in 6 days. This has been a great 2 weeks of Vacation. While I've been down here I have had some fun time meeting new anglers all over. Last Wednesday I headed over to 2nd Avenue Pier to see what was biting and how many people were on the pier fishing. We walked all the way down to the end of the pier to find a group of men that were fishing. These guys were awesome! None of them knew each other but if you walked up to them, they looked and acted as if they came together just to fish. Most of the time when I go to the pier it is filled with people and 80% of them are drunk and rude and don't want you talking to them. These guys were catching Spot, Ribbon Fish, Shark and some relaxation from the wives.

     "My Wife wants to do Recreation, like Para-sailing, Shopping and Roller Coasters... I just want to RELAX... That's why I'm here.", said one random Angler on the pier. We were there for at least a Hour, just talking listening to how they rig their lines and swapping some good ole fishing stories.


    A couple of days later I talked Melissa into going crabbing with me. Crabbing is a very, very, very, VERY easy thing to do and I'll do a short "HOW-TO" story on CRABBING and what our success was.

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SUPPLIES
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First off You need Feet. and then Legs. and then. Hands. and I guess you need a brain.. jk.

but seriously this is the list of what you need!

1.) Crab Trap
2.) Small Diameter 50ft rope (If it doesn't already come with the Crab Trap you purchased.)
3.) Chicken Neck, Chicken Drum Stick, Turkey Neck, Fish Head (All of these baits will do great)
4.) Cooler for captured crabs with the surrounding water in it
5.) Cooler for your drinks/snacks to keep you hydrated
6.) Gloves (Just in case you are scared of getting pinched)
7.) Towel (so you can wipe your hands off after touching raw bait)
8.) SunBlock!
9.) A comfy chair
10.) and a pretty girl with a umbrella just to keep you company and help you check the traps!

*Check the Tide chart for where you will be crabbing*
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     Well, Melissa and I headed down to Murrells Inlet Last Friday and we stopped by a bait shop I heard about on the internet called "Perry's Bait Shop". Great place to go to get supplies and learn from the pros. We purchased 2 Crab Traps that collapse on 2 sides (They are more heavy duty than normal crab nets) and they were $18.00 a piece which isn't amazing price but isn't too bad either. This day we used turkey necks because they ran out of chicken necks. I have never crabbed in Murrells Inlet so I googled some places and found a pier called "Veteran's Pier" which is right beside Captain Dick's Fishing Charters.

It was low tide when we arrived, WHICH is when you want to be at your location to crab! We found a deeper hole right beside the marina and set up camp there! I put our turkey necks in our crab traps and tied our ropes to them. We then proceeded to CRAB, I placed my trap on one side of the pier and she placed her's on the other side of the pier.

 
Now the instructions on putting your crab trap in the water is no difficult task, you can do it anyway you want but we found that if you lower crab net right above the water and swing it out 5 feet(either straight out or diagonal) and make sure your crab net sinks straight down produces more crabs. Now if you have the kind of traps that we have you need to make sure your trap doors open up so you can actually allow the crabs in the trap! We modified our trap doors with small weights so we will always know that our doors will open. On a side note, make sure your trap is in enough water so the water is above the trap.

   After, we put the traps in the water we organized our spot and got us something cold to drink and chilled for about 3 minutes and then we checked our traps. To check the trap make sure you pull the trap up quickly but make sure it isn't too close to the pier so your trap doesn't get stuck on the pier and then you loose all of your crabs.

   We pulled up our traps and both had 1 blue crab each!

To keep a blue crab, it has to be 5 inches MINIMUM point to point to keep it!

AND THAT'S HOW SIMPLE IT IS TO CRABB IT UP!  We stayed out there Friday for about 2 hours and caught about 14 crabs but only had 7 keepers and then we caught a baby flounder in one trap.

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We went back to Veteran's pier 2 days later and caught 13 crabs but only had about 5 keepers that met the standards. But during that crabbing day I brought my rod-n-reels to fish while we waited for crabs. I had Melissa rigged up with a open face reel and had it rigged carolina style with fresh cut shrimp and for myself I had my baitcaster with a BPS XPS Rattle Shad.

Melissa caught a baby fishy and then she hooked a HUGE crab with her rod-n-reel and lost it right when it got to the pier. I was casting and retrieving my lure pretty quick behind boats that were passing in the middle of HUGE balls of baitfish, and hooked a flounder and it fought great! I was suprised that I caught the flounder with the rattle shad but It was cool.







I purchased some new lures at the Bass Pro Shop: Myrtle Beach so we are heading out again tomorrow to crab and fish!

****You can use 2 crab traps per person without a saltwater fishing license!****

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