Hunting Washington Forum

Other Activities => Fishing => Topic started by: DoubleJ on July 10, 2012, 02:44:17 PM

Title: crawdad question
Post by: DoubleJ on July 10, 2012, 02:44:17 PM: how do you know if a lake has crawdads in it? Is there a way other than throwing out a trap and checking it in a few hours?
Title: Re: crawdad question
Post by: rackattack on July 10, 2012, 02:52:45 PM: :yeah: :chuckle:
Title: Re: crawdad question
Post by: h20hunter on July 10, 2012, 02:53:40 PM: Carefull though.....spawing bluegill and other sunnies have a simliar scent when they are on beds. I recommend looking for a good hound to ride the bow and "bay 'em up" when he is on scent.
Title: Re: crawdad question
Post by: sirfunkeybut on July 10, 2012, 02:53:52 PM: Spotlight the shallows or rockbeds you can see?
Title: Re: crawdad question
Post by: Curly on July 10, 2012, 02:54:59 PM: I doubt there is a lake in WA without crawdads in it. :twocents:
Title: Re: crawdad question
Post by: jackmaster on July 10, 2012, 03:04:20 PM: pretty much any lake that is creek or river fed has crawdads, find a spot 8 to 10 ft deep that is pretty rocky and drop a pot with a big ball of bacon in a bait box, check it after 20 minutes if there are craws in there then hammer down, if you make a drive to ft lewis muck creek is flat loaded with them, or mineral lake out by morton, a good one is the mashel river, tons of crawdads in there and any little creek that dumps into it, if you ever head out to sequim kramers creek has some of the biggest craws i have ever seen or caught, like little damn lobsters :EAT:
Title: Re: crawdad question
Post by: DoubleJ on July 10, 2012, 03:08:03 PM: Quote from: JKEEN33 on July 10, 2012, 02:46:43 PM
Watch the lake real close for crawdad fart bubbles.

:tung:
Title: Re: crawdad question
Post by: DoubleJ on July 10, 2012, 03:10:11 PM: Quote from: Curly on July 10, 2012, 02:54:59 PM
I doubt there is a lake in WA without crawdads in it. :twocents:

I have Timberlakes here in Mason County about 2 blocks away. I've seen them in the Spokane River but never here. In the Spokane River you just lift up a rock. Timberlakes has no decent size rocks in the shallows though
Title: Re: crawdad question
Post by: DoubleJ on July 10, 2012, 03:11:00 PM: Any regs or limits?

edit: nevermind. Found them
Title: Re: crawdad question
Post by: jackmaster on July 10, 2012, 03:13:11 PM: back when we crawdaded there werent no regs but i bet there is now, lord only knows where a guy would find those regs at, call the game department and i betcha they wont have a clue either, or it will be a 50 dollar license :chuckle:
Title: Re: crawdad question
Post by: DoubleJ on July 10, 2012, 03:16:53 PM: (https://hunting-washington.com/smf/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fimg.photobucket.com%2Falbums%2Fv612%2Fdoublej88%2Fcat-1.jpg&hash=8f9ffbd3cf1159b2cda27ab3160cf17cdda9fd76)
Title: Re: crawdad question
Post by: jackmaster on July 10, 2012, 03:25:43 PM: sweet there ya go, 10 pounds is alot of dads but not much meat
Title: Re: crawdad question
Post by: DoubleJ on July 10, 2012, 03:27:38 PM: When I was living in Houston, I used-to-could eat 2, 5lb buckets in a sitting. That was 12 years ago though.
Title: Re: crawdad question
Post by: Miles on July 10, 2012, 03:31:48 PM: Next they'll have a limit on how many worms you can dig... 2 dozen worms, but they must be killed prior to removing them from the dirt (humanely). :chuckle:
Title: Re: crawdad question
Post by: Atroxus on July 10, 2012, 03:34:08 PM: I am not a fan of shellfish personally, but I am half tempted to build myself a crawdad pot. My wife is from down south and she mentions often that she misses the crawfish from Louisiana. I try to tell her we have crawdads here but she don't believe me. Maybe I will see if I can get a recipe from one of her relatives and surprise her one day.
Title: Re: crawdad question
Post by: buglebuster on July 10, 2012, 03:37:29 PM: i seem to find alot of them around here but have always been nervous to eat them out of the local ponds, do you guys think there would be any problem with it?
Title: Re: crawdad question
Post by: Miles on July 10, 2012, 04:16:04 PM: Quote from: Atroxus on July 10, 2012, 03:34:08 PM
I am not a fan of shellfish personally, but I am half tempted to build myself a crawdad pot. My wife is from down south and she mentions often that she misses the crawfish from Louisiana. I try to tell her we have crawdads here but she don't believe me. Maybe I will see if I can get a recipe from one of her relatives and surprise her one day.

You should look around. I bought one at the White Elephant in Spokane for $19.99. Pretty cheap IMO.
Title: Re: crawdad question
Post by: sirfunkeybut on July 10, 2012, 04:38:34 PM: Quote from: buglebuster on July 10, 2012, 03:37:29 PM
i seem to find alot of them around here but have always been nervous to eat them out of the local ponds, do you guys think there would be any problem with it?

:yeah: I've seen to many people bathing in local ponds. Rotary especially
Title: Re: crawdad question
Post by: DoubleJ on July 10, 2012, 05:00:43 PM: Just went down to the lake with a homemade pot and a bacon ball. 3 different spots for 25-30 minutes each. Nothing. it's a very muddy bottom full of weeds, not rocks.
Title: Re: crawdad question
Post by: Kola16 on July 10, 2012, 05:28:16 PM: Quote from: DoubleJ on July 10, 2012, 05:00:43 PM
Just went down to the lake with a homemade pot and a bacon ball. 3 different spots for 25-30 minutes each. Nothing. it's a very muddy bottom full of weeds, not rocks.

I have property on a lake that has a muddy bottom. The only way that I can catch them during the day is if I go to the outlet where there are sticks to flip over, and go snorkeling for them. I catch them in a trap by leaving it over night.
Title: Re: crawdad question
Post by: DoubleJ on July 10, 2012, 05:41:49 PM: Quote from: Kola16 on July 10, 2012, 05:28:16 PM
Quote from: DoubleJ on July 10, 2012, 05:00:43 PM
Just went down to the lake with a homemade pot and a bacon ball. 3 different spots for 25-30 minutes each. Nothing. it's a very muddy bottom full of weeds, not rocks.

I have property on a lake that has a muddy bottom. The only way that I can catch them during the day is if I go to the outlet where there are sticks to flip over, and go snorkeling for them. I catch them in a trap by leaving it over night.

Thanks for the tip. I'll try that
Title: Re: crawdad question
Post by: TheSkyBuster on July 10, 2012, 06:54:00 PM: I'm not gunna give up my honey hole but I'll share my technique. I like to find an area with catails in the water that extend out from shore about 10'. I will toss my pot over the catails into the open water then pull the rope untill the pot is at the edge of the cattails on the water side. I find it takes atleast an hour or two for the crayfish to start finding there way into the pots (a 25 minute soak has never worked for me) so be patient. I leave em out for atleast 4 hours. As for bait I've used catfood, sardines, and lately canned pink salmon, it all seems to work fine. The biggest thing is loacation. My honey hole is freakin loaded with em. :chuckle: but once I pull a full pot out of a spot I'll be lucky to get a few within a hundred feet of that spot for the next few weeks.
Title: Re: crawdad question
Post by: HUNTINCOUPLE on July 10, 2012, 06:59:32 PM: Try goolgle search on crawfish! If i remember Beaver Lk king co has transplanted Louisiana crawfish in it! There were some good articles on crawfish in the state of wa. :tup:
Title: Re: crawdad question
Post by: DoubleJ on July 10, 2012, 07:16:28 PM: Quote from: TheSkyBuster on July 10, 2012, 06:54:00 PM
I'm not gunna give up my honey hole but I'll share my technique. I like to find an area with catails in the water that extend out from shore about 10'. I will toss my pot over the catails into the open water then pull the rope untill the pot is at the edge of the cattails on the water side. I find it takes atleast an hour or two for the crayfish to start finding there way into the pots (a 25 minute soak has never worked for me) so be patient. I leave em out for atleast 4 hours. As for bait I've used catfood, sardines, and lately canned pink salmon, it all seems to work fine. The biggest thing is loacation. My honey hole is freakin loaded with em. :chuckle: but once I pull a full pot out of a spot I'll be lucky to get a few within a hundred feet of that spot for the next few weeks.

My lake looks just like you describe
Title: Re: crawdad question
Post by: KFhunter on July 10, 2012, 07:30:39 PM: These are the traps I use - spend some time in this website there is a ton of information here.

http://www.terrybullard.com/ (http://www.terrybullard.com/)

I had two traps go missing (theft), so find the page talking about how to keep your traps from being stolen. IE: don't use a float!

I got 4 traps now and a holding cage. Man I gotta get out there after some craws!
Title: Re: crawdad question
Post by: HUNTINCOUPLE on July 10, 2012, 07:48:56 PM: That terrybullard site is cool! Thanks for the info. :tup:
Title: Re: crawdad question
Post by: smdave on July 10, 2012, 08:07:58 PM: www.youtube.com/watch?v=dfrjKKfZ3t0 (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dfrjKKfZ3t0#)
Title: Re: crawdad question
Post by: DoubleJ on July 10, 2012, 08:39:20 PM: I watched part one and 2 just before you posted the video. Is that you?
Title: Re: crawdad question
Post by: smdave on July 10, 2012, 09:07:08 PM: Quote from: DoubleJ on July 10, 2012, 08:39:20 PM
Is that you?

No, just thought it might help the fishing
Title: Re: crawdad question
Post by: HUNTINCOUPLE on July 10, 2012, 09:21:56 PM: Not to get off subject but check out you tube how to boil crawfish! There is some funny funny stuff there! :chuckle: