Keeping shore/swimming crabs

[Plod]

Hi guys,
just thought I'd post this to gauge opinion and see if anyone knew the official line on this.

Went down to Seaton harbour this evening with my kids to do some crabbing. (They have considerably more success than I do fishing )

Anyway, when I arrived a found a family of Eastern Europeans also crabbing and putting them in a large insulated picnic box. OK I thought, maybe they don't have a bucket. They got to the point where the box was overflowing with crabs, and low and behold they slammed on the lid, threw it in the car (English reg) and drove off, before I had a chance to say anything.

Does anyone know if this is legal? Obviously, if they were collecting for bait, and taking a few, then I wouldn't have a problem, but they were keeping these to eat.
The reason I ask is that I took the reg, and they must be local, so I'll pay them a visit if they are in the wrong and point out the error of their ways.

They must have taken a couple of hundred crabs, all around 7cm across the widest part of the shell.

I have come across this "Free food bonanza" before with Poles. They were catching the swans in Dorking to eat.

Cheers, Darren

[cuckoo]

[quote=Plod]Hi guys,
They were catching the swans in Dorking to eat
CATCHING SWANS TO EAT!!!!!!

Hope they were nicked !!!!!!!
as for the crabs mate god only knows why they would want so many?

cheers lee.

[Greenheart]

Quite tempted to eat the odd swan myself, especially when they keep pestering you when you are fishing. (Only Joking)
As for the crabs, I can only imagine that they are going to boil them up as a base for seafood soup of some sort. I believe it's quite common in France to use small crabs & undersize fish for this. Not sure if theres any minimum size limit for them though. i'm sure someone will know.

[Norfolkboy]

Just seen this in Portland Jon's post

Crustacean sizes

[cuckoo]

Dont forget dan thats from a boat !!!!

im sure from the shore it will be smaller ?

cheers lee.

[Greenheart]

Thats the size limit for Brown or edible crab, not shore, velvet or swimming crabs. Might be worth contacting DEFRA fisheries Dept.
Found this link that may help.
http://erycdata.eastriding.gov.uk/pl...ONDUCT_GB_.PDF

The North Eastern fisheries board have a size limit of 65mm

[Ben]

i dont think its any different to collecting for bait im afraid, in which case u are asking if bait collecting is illegal
last summer i regularly collected bucket loads of hard backs to use as bait, for all we know they might have been doing the same, or maybe keeping them to bring on the peel
i cant see any reason why what they have done could be illegal

[Fishing Forum Admin]

You need to contact defra and the do reply to emails as long as you give the whole picture. Takes about 5 days and every time I have contacted them it has been very good

http://www.defra.gov.uk/corporate/contacts/contact.asp

[Plod]

Cheers guys for the replies. I'll get in touch with DEFRA and seek their views.
I know what you are saying about bait Ben, but like my posts on mackerel last year, there has to be some sense of moderation in this. If we don't take a responsible attitude towards it, we make ourselves no better than the commercial men that deplete fish stocks. If everybody who fished went down and took the amount of crabs they took, pretty soon, they would be in fewer numbers, which would mean fewer fish that feed on them.

I'm no tree hugging hippie, but just think that we should only be taking as many as we need.

Hope this doesn't come across patronising,

Regards, Darren

[cuckoo]

Excellent advice darren !!!!!!