"How to Catch Crabs" - Part 2

There are no crabs in Desolation Sound!!! That’s what I am told. How can there be no crabs? There’s every other kind of fish. What is there – some kind of “Do not enter” sign out there that only crabs obey? Doesn’t make sense to me. So, I’m going to crab.

In Tenedos Bay, with Warner’s help, I clumsily rig up the trap. For bait, I use sliced bacon. Bill is absolutely incredulous. That’s his breakfast going to the crabs! We drop the trap being careful not to drop it in an area deeper than my sinkable line (about 75’) or else that will be the end of crab trap, bait, line and float. Next morning – no crabs.

Also, next morning, to appease Bill, I make him bacon and eggs. He’s somewhat mollified.

At a local store where I finally find and purchase an 8 oz. weight, I’m told again that there are no crabs in Desolation Sound, but it is prawn season. My one year license covers prawns, but no way can I ask Bill to buy a prawn trap, bait trap (they like cat food) and 200’ of sinkable line! With envy, I watch all the prawn traps glide by.

Two days later, we decide to try crabbing again. The word is that if any crab does head into Desolation Sound, he migrates to Okeover Bay. Shortly before arrival at the bay, I pull the trap out of the aft locker. There’s a horrible smell. It’s the bacon from 2 days ago. There’s no way we can use that, but Bill says that old and smelly is what crabs like. I say no. “How to Catch Crabs” says that crabs are gourmands. The better the food, the bigger the crab. So the bacon goes over the side with Bill insisting that all the crabs, if any are around, will be screaming after that bacon. I fill the bait trap with saved chicken fat and fish skins. Yum-m-m. Over the side it goes, and we go off to anchor elsewhere for lunch. Hours later – no crabs. Bill gloats that that’s because all the crabs went after the bacon.

Between day 1 and day 2 of crabbing, we try fishing. Warner and I practice our fish line knots, following the drawings in “103 Fishing Secrets”. Got that down. Now we rig the contraption plus weight to the fishing pole and throw it overboard. As the line goes zinging out, we somehow keep our fingers from being sliced in two by the line as we let it out without creating a tangled mess. We’re not sure how to determine how much line is out, but eventually we decide that it’s enough. I sit and wait for a fish to bite. As suspected, no self respecting fish would go after that thing. Time’s up. I reel in the line. You can see the flasher being pulled thru the water as it flashes its way toward us. By the time, it’s back on the boat, the flashing has been abraded off. New flasher needed - $14.00.

Every harbor we’re in, anyone I can ask, I drill about fishing and crabbing techniques. I’m told that once we’re past Campbell River and the Rapids (The Rapids? That’s another story), I will find crabs and fish. Port Hardy and north is the key. One kindly gentleman tells me of a bay across from Port Hardy where if I anchor at night, throw out a line, I’ll have a halibut by morning. Wow, that’s just what I’m hoping for! I go to bed dreaming of halibut.

Around 2:00 am, I wake up suddenly with the thought that a halibut isn’t going to be patiently waiting for me with a hook in its mouth at the end of a line some morning. I don’t expect a salmon to come along nicely when I reel him in so why should a halibut? The whole idea strikes me as hilarious. It’s 2:00 in the morning, and I’m lying in bed with tears running down my face. Fortunately, Bill sleeps thru the whole episode. The next morning I tell the guys about my mistakenly naïve ideas. They both look at me with incredulous bemusement. I’m still laughing at my gaff, and they know now for sure I’ve lost it. Guess I don’t blame them. Bill wants to know if I know what a halibut looks like. No, why should I? The closest I’ve come to a halibut is slices in a fish store. So, out comes a book with a picture of a halibut, and it is not anybody’s idea of good looking! As I look at the picture, I can’t help thinking that when Mother Nature was into fish creating, she must have run out of inspiration. After all, there’s only so many things you can do with a basic fish shape. So she gave a lump of clay to her 3 year-old daughter and said, “Sweetie, make Mommy a fish”. She got what she asked for, and not wanting to squash her daughter’s budding creativity, she kept the thing. And that’s how Halibut came into being. Only she called it “forthehellofit” which changed, as words do over time, to Halibut. (Origin Story: Grun First Nations tribe)

The guys tell me that a halibut can weigh over 100 pounds and really isn’t something I want at the end of my line. No, I think not. I’m not greedy. At this moment, any ole fish will do as long as it meets the size limits, is edible, and I can get it in the boat!