This Saturday, November 4, 2023 marks the opening of recreational Dungeness crab fishing for the 2023-2024 season in our. In order to avoid entanglements with the large number of whales feeding in nearshore areas along California’s coast, the use of long-soak crab traps will not be allowed at this time. Anglers are allowed to use hoop nets, crab snares and to take crab by hand for now. The season is scheduled to run through June 30, 2024.

Unlike rigid crab traps, hoop nets lay flat on the ocean floor, with an open top. However many crab might be in the net at the time it is retrieved is the number you catch, barring any that might swim out of the net on the way up to the surface. Hoop netting can be a very productive technique for crabbing. Regulations allow for a maximum soak time of two hours for any hoop net being used for crab. Crab pots can be checked, rebaited, and redeployed to be checked again after several days, but hoop nets cannot be left unattended or unchecked for more than two hours. Essentially, they go home when you do so as not to present an ongoing entanglement threat like a long-soaking crab pot. There is no limit for the number of hoop nets utilized by boaters, but crabbing from public piers has a limit of two devices per angler.

Another underutilized technique for catching Dungeness is the crab snare. Used as a terminal rig on a heavy fishing rod, the snare is like a weighted bait box, with up to six sliding loops arrayed along the sides. When crabs come in to eat the bait, the loops slide down like a lasso allowing an angler to pull the snare and the crabs in. Snares can be deployed from a boat, or from the shoreline or piers. You may be able to catch only one Dungeness at a time using the snare, but two or three Dungies makes a meal for the whole family.  And, you don’t need a boat. 

Most Dungeness crab in the Monterey Bay are found in deeper water, from 150-220 feet. Further up the coast towards Half Moon Bay and Pacifica, the crab can be located much closed to shore. A good old fat surf rod used off one of the wild north coat beaches to cast out for crab is not a bad idea at all. Size and bag limits remain the same for Dungeness this season, with 10 crab per angler per day allowed. The Dungeness must measure at least 5-3/4 inches in width, measured across the crab just in front of the lateral spines.