The MeatEater Podcast - Ep. 905: The Life of a Crabber

Episode Date: July 20, 2026

Steven Rinella talks with professional crabber, Luke McFadden, about: the crabbing industry, crabbing techniques, crab biology, crab grading, and more. Connect with Steve and The MeatEater Podcast Network Steve on Instagram and Twitter MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and YouTubeSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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No shortcuts, just gear that work. Check it out at firstlight.com. That's f-I-R-S-T-L-I-T-E.com. You're joining us from the walleye grounds of Lake of the Woods, Ontario, but we're here to talk about the life of a crabber in Chesapeake Bay back in America. Luke McFadden, thanks for coming on the show. Thanks for having me. First question for you, though, before we get into crab,

and we're here for the Fish Eater Classic fishing tournament. you've been spending a couple days in a boat with DirtMith. That's right. Any takeaways? I like him, man. He's cool. Oh, dirt's the best. Yeah, he's the man, dude.

He's like, not only is he, like, you know, doing all the film and this and that and has somehow been able to, like, bob and weave every single hook flying past his head. Sure. He's also, like, you know, he's part of the team, man. He's keeping morale up. He's, like, he's doing it. Every situation. Yeah, I find that every situation is bad.

better with dirt around. I agree, man. So you're, you're, you approve of the camera man. I agree. I do. Excellent. So, tell me, like, I've followed you for a long time. We've talked before.

And I know kind of like the basic outline is that, that in Chesapeake Bay, like in the, in the blue crab world, that tends to be a thing that, that people kind of inherit. Yeah. You know, people, people come up in it and their kids come up in it. Is that true? Like, it's the thing that's like there's a little bit of a, I don't know, man, like it gets handed down generation to generation that lifestyle. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

You could call it like a hereditary disease. Hereditary disease. In a lot of ways. But, yeah, it's generally like generational, you know. So it's mostly like, you know, you do it because your dad did it. He did it because his dad did it and he did it because there was no other option. You know what I mean? I got it.

But you didn't inherit it. No, no. So walk me through that, like, because, I mean, because you're a, professional craver. Yeah. And have been for how many years? I mean, this is, I started on my own boat when I was 11 years old. Or no, when I was, sorry, 18 years old.

Okay. I'm 30, so it's my, I think this is my 11th crab season. Got it. So it's been a little while. I think I've got my 10,000 hours. And how many of those seats, like, not that there's a lot of similarities between crabbing and writing, but in writing, like, you write for years with side jobs. Yeah.

A lot of people do. You write for years with side jobs and all of a sudden you're like, damn. Yeah, yeah. I don't need the side job anymore. Right. I mean, was it when you're crab and you're all in and that's just what you're doing? Or did you have to kind of like, did you have to kind of trickle into it? So, I mean, definitely like in the beginning, I mean, it was like just a disaster for a very long time.

Is that right? Oh, yeah, dude. It was like, you know, a lot to learn quickly. Steep learning curve. But, you know, I was like, it was like I was basically working in the wintertime. time to be able to go crabbing again in the spring. You know what I mean? And I was just hustling any way I possibly could, you know, to continue to go in the beginning, you know. But I was just kind of committed to it, you know.

I was like not going to let it fail. So why did you, why did you want to get into that anyway? What were you seeing that made you want to do it? I mean, I started helping on a crab boat and I was like 12. Okay. Just guy started taking me along, you know, I was just cutting fish and stuff like that and I don't know I just liked it out there and when I was 18 I just decided I wanted to you know do it and all when you were helping out how would you get compensated I mean I was getting paid you know not much you know pretty much nothing you know when I was a little older like 16 17 I was making a little bit more but I mean I think the most I got I made like when I was breaking off to go do my own thing was like I think I was making like 85 bucks a day or something like

back. Okay. So, you know, it wasn't much. It was cash, but it wasn't much. Yeah. Um, yeah. Like, so, so you, were you surrounded by where you grew up? Were you surrounded by crabbers? No. There's not many cravers around at all. Like, the area that I'm from, in particular, Pasadena is like, there's a few, but it's not, uh, it's not common whatsoever. I think, like, we did a headcount of the fleet, I think, like, guys are, you know, out there making their living doing it. Um, I think there's, like, um, I think there's, like, six or eight of us left going out of the whole town. Oh, no kidding.

There's some more north of us. There's a few south of us. There's a lot more on the eastern shore. Like, I'm on the western shore, Maryland. Okay. On the eastern shore, there's a lot more cravers. It's, you know, way more common. Yeah.

But there's a whole, you know, there's a lot less job opportunity over there. You know, it's a lot less developed. And, you know, there's a lot more low country and whatever. So historically, there's always a lot more cravers on the eastern shore. Got it. But in your town, six, eight guys go out. Yeah, there's not many. Yeah. Tell me, like, how are you guys, I mean, I've gone getting blue crabs little ways. Like, I mean, I've gone from just walking around picking them up, stringing the chicken necks and all that.

How are you guys doing it? Like, what does your day look like? How do you catch them? So we're crab potting. Okay. So there's basically, like, two ways to commercially catch crabs where I'm at. And it's, one is a trot line. So you got that long, you know, line. with inline bait, you know, and then you're running along with a dipper or a net and different long. I've done that with guys. Yeah.

You know, where you, I don't know, 100 chicken necks on the string. Yeah, yeah, I got it. And there ain't nothing wrong with that, you know, that's a great way to go. That's how everybody starts usually because not a lot of overhead. You can do it by yourself. Is that how you did it? In the beginning, yeah. Okay.

And how many how many baits would be on that line that you're running? Usually, like, you're running, like, you know, some of the bigger guys are running up to 5,000 foot a line. Sometimes they'll break it up into like 1,000 foot or 1,200 foot sections. And then, you know, there's debate on how far you want your bait spaced. And, you know, there's some signs to it in terms of like, you know, guys will have different lines with different spaced baits for different bottom, different times of the year, all that kind of stuff. Yeah, and you're talking that deal where, like, just for people listen, like, it's this big long line with every what distance. It's usually like, I would say the average, I think ours are like seven foot, seven or eight foot.

Okay, seven or eight feet, no hooks. Yeah. Just bait. Yeah, so they either put them, like, in line. Like, they'll either use, like, that old school, like, twisted, like, hemp line almost. And they'll just push it together and then put the bait in line. Oh, that's how they do it. Yeah, that's like the old school way in doing it.

Or now, like, a lot of guys like to run snooze is what they call it. So it's like a piece of bungee, like, probably six inches. Okay. With a piece of, like, gas line. You know, you tie it. you tie knot in the end of the bungee and then double it over and stick the gas line over the loop. So it's like a, you know, like a, you can cinch it down with the baits on it. I got it.

That's kind of like the newer way to do it. A lot of guys like to run clam bags and all that stuff. They call it a snood? Called a snood. That's what comes off of Turkey's head. Yeah, yeah, I guess so. Right. And then you string that sucker out and they're not hooked.

They're just hanging on to the bait. Yeah, crabs are kind of about as stubborn as the guys to go catch them. So they're just like, you know, they're in it for the, they'll hold on to that thing all the way up. man you can you raise the line up just nab them off there as they drop free yeah you got like an arm that hangs off the side of the boat and then uh you pull up there's a buoy on either end you pick up the buoy and put that on the arm and then you drive the boat down the line and as you're driving down the line isn't really moving but you're picking the line up you know what mean are there dudes to do that by themselves i i would say most guys to do that do it that way

do it by themselves driving the boat yeah yeah yeah yeah I mean, I did it by myself. Most guys do. Because you ain't got to pay a helper, you know? So, like, a lot of times we'll set the boats up kind of different. Like, I got a little trout lining boat. Oh, you do still? Yeah, we got one that.

Some of my, we built for, like, some of my helpers and everything. They've been wanting to go. But, like, we even have it with a, the console is just an eight-by-eight piece of aluminum square tube. And you stand on the right side of the boat in between, you know, the console. on your left side and then your rollers on your right and the steering wheel is actually on like facing the starboard side yeah so that you can stand there and just run it move steer with your left hand and then dip with your right hand and then you got the call box in front of you know what I mean so it's you can run it as a one-man band pretty easy yeah yeah but they're like you'll see some goofy

boats but it's like there's always a reason they're set up kind of weird you know what I mean it looks strange you're facing forward you know steering like this but it allows you to do it by yourself But the main deal is running crab traps. Yeah, so I'm potting. I'm crab potting. Which is kind of, some guys would argue, but it's, I guess, the more industrial, like larger scale. So I got gang lines, you know, we call them underwater lines. Okay.

And it's 25 pots connected to each other. Okay. With a buoy called a hawk on either end. So it's like a buoy with a five-foot piece of PVC pipe through it with a weight at the bottom and then a flag at the top. And then I like what's the term? We call it a hawk. What's that come from? I have no idea.

Okay. I've always wondered because like a long lining, like deep sea long lining, they call it a bird. You know, we call them hawks. I don't know why. Yeah. You know. But yeah, there's 75 foot in between each crab pot. Each pot's on snap gear.

So, you know, it's got like a 24 inch liter, basically with like a metal clip. And then every 75 foot on the main line, there's like an overhand loop tied in the main line. And so each clip gets clipped onto the loop. So when we go to pick up the crab pots, we actually pick the entire row up, stack them on the boat. And then, you know, like I'm putting the line on the winder, and the winder's hauling it into a barrel. The barrel, I have a piece of PVC pipe, you know, screwed to the side of the barrel. and so as each pot comes up, I break the snap gear off of the main line

and then stack all the loops on the PVC pipe in order. Got it. You know? And then all the line goes in the barrel. And then each pot as it comes up, I'll break it off the main line. And then the shaker, who's kind of like your right-hand guy, he'll open up the top door, flip the pot up,

open the bait door, shake the crabs out, put new bait in it, close the bait door, and then put it into like a hot water tank that's like kind of behind us. And that's cleaning the crab box. That's a strange deal there, man. Yeah. That's like 90% of crabbing though.

It's keeping gear clean in the summertime, you know. Because, well, I got a bunch of questions, but just tell me that real quick. Explain that hot water deal. So what you're cleaning off. We're trying, like crabs, everybody thinks they're just like dumb scavengers, right? But, I mean, there's a way that you can go out there and catch crabs. You can go out there and make a living catching crabs. And the devil's in the detail, right?

So we clean every pot every time it comes over the rail. And we don't let them sit more than like four days in the summertime, you know? So what we're trying to prevent is these pots growing, things like algae, barnacles. We have this like brown stuff that we call it hair. It looks just like hair, but it's technically kind of coral. These little arthropods that we get, they're like little shrimp we call them. And they, it'll look like your pots covered in like, grains of brown rice.

Yeah. They build these little huts that they live inside of, you know, and then the stuff, the algae and things like that will catch on their little huts and start to grow. Yep. So we're just trying to prevent any of that stuff, you know. So if you see my pots, ideally, they look like they're brand new. They look like they're not dirty at all, but it's because we hit them every time. We're literally trying to kill it like on a microscopic level before it even appears.

Are you trying to do it because the long, like, the longevity of the pot or the performance of the pot? performance of the pot. The crabs, they don't want to trap up in a dirty pot. They don't even like a slime on it or nothing really. They, they want like that. I don't know, man. I really don't. Because you'd think, right, that like it looks a little more natural to the bottom or something. I mean, like, because the bottom is all. The bottom's all covered in that stuff. I know. It's crazy. I don't know. But yeah, we're trying to keep them clean. They don't want to go into a dirty pot. No, man, they don't want to. But they also don't want to go into a brand new freshly set pot or a brand new pot. Because it might smell of production.

Yeah, exactly. Like, we paint every pot every year. So we dip all the pots into it, like a vat of paint to, you know, give them a fresh coat. But like a freshly painted pot. I've seen it where they do like it, but 90% of the time, they don't want a freshly painted pot. So you got to let it weather. Yeah, exactly. But you got to fish it through, too.

You got to, like, let it soak and then fish it through, get to do fresh bait in it. Usually it's like a week, two weeks, and they'll really start to catch right. Man, that is so like not how you think of a crab, man. I know. That's what I'm saying, man. Everybody thinks the crabs is like they're these dirty scavengers that are just, you know, they'll eat whatever. And you think that's like, you're convinced that that's right. I mean.

He doesn't want to go in a dirty pot. It's facts. I mean, you know, it's, I go through a insane amount of effort to keep gear clean. I mean, that's the whole job in the summer is keeping gear. And, I mean, anybody that's doing it. Like, you could look at it like you're trapping crabs or you're cleaning gear. You look at it like you're cleaning. Yeah, I look at it.

I literally look at it like I'm cleaning gear and I'm hoping there's crabs in it, you know? So tell me how, like, you put in a hot water bath and you agitated or what do you do? No, no, just, I mean, since we're hitting them every time, every day, like, we're kind of keeping ahead of it, you know. Yeah, yeah. So they just sit in there for, I think, cycle time

is probably seven to 12 seconds on a pot, you know. How hot's the water? 145 degrees. So it's not like super high. So the air's already real hot and then you're hovering over that damn thing. Yeah. Yeah. It's, um, yeah, I mean, and we're wearing, you know, rubber slickers and rubber boots.

So there's some brutal days out there. Yeah. You know, when it's like stupid humid, like heat index over 100, this tank, 145 degree water's right behind me. There's a diesel burner heating it like right next to that. That's what that's what heats that tank. Yeah, I built it out of like a, uh, a, heat pump from a house like a becket heat pump um basically runs it through like a coil what i'm saying like i know what that means but i don't know what the beckett heat pump is so what heats your house if you

have like an oil furnace yeah i got you yeah same kind of deal got it but my runs off car back golf cart batteries oh really yeah um so yeah i mean it can be definitely be pretty brutal like the other second day of fishing whatever everybody was or the first day you know everybody's like dying of the heat and i was like man this ain't so bad i was like it doesn't it doesn't It does suck, but I was like. Just isn't phasing it. Yeah. Well, I mean, it, you know, obviously I'm not loving it, but I was like, at least I ain't wearing

a trash bag on the crab boat. You know what I mean? How many, how many, how big is your crew? Me and three. We'll come back to that. So it's four guys in the boat. Yeah. And in a day, if you're going like all out pulling pots.

Yeah. In a day, how many traps you're gonna check? 575. Okay. And then. So 23 rows. What's a, I'm sure it's seasonal, but just give me like, give me like like they're working right now right your crew is out there right now yeah yeah so so

right now um July a pot that has blank crabs is exciting and a pot that has blank crabs is disappointing like what are the blanks i mean i'm so like right now it's pretty hot it's good yeah so i mean like right now if i see not all crabs are created equal right so i'm looking for big market size crabs So I would say if I had a pot with six nice big, heavy, market-sized crabs, good grade, that's a good pot. Okay. You do that 575 times. You know, you're looking all right. Yeah.

Right now there's a load of crabs around, which is a good thing, but it's also can be kind of a pain, you know? Like, you would pull up a pot, it's got 20 crabs. I'd say the average pot has 10 to 15 crabs in it right now. Got it. But I would say, like right now there's a load of little crabs around, a lot of light crabs, all that kind of stuff. they've shed out, you know, there could be more than half of those crabs could be small or, you know, we got to squeeze every one of them to check the grade on them. What's that mean?

So like we grade crabs by the density of their shell, which indicates how much meat is inside of them. And that is from when they shed out, you know. Yeah, the denser the crab, the more meat, right? Generally, yeah. Yeah, why is that? Like, I see that with Dungeon Ass, like, I don't know if you're familiar with that crab. Yeah. I've seen them.

So when you get one, it's soft, it's just water inside there. Why is that? It's because they shit when they shed, you know, so they'll go to sluff their shell. Obviously, they have exoskeleton, right? They can't grow their skeleton, so they have to shed out of it, so they grow a larger skeleton inside their shell. And then they'll back out of the back of their shell and be a soft crab. but it takes them a little while to get that new shell hard. So they kind of fill it out full of water inside of them.

And then all their energy is going to getting that shell hard as fast as they can. And then they muscle it up. Yeah, to be able to defend themselves. So they're absorbing like calcium through the water and all that kind of stuff to get their shells harder. A lot of times we'll find light crabs on shell bottom, hard bottom, because they're hanging out on oyster beds and things like that, picking at the shells, you know, trying to get right to be hard enough to defend themselves. And then after they do that, then they'll start to fill their insides out.

You know what I mean? It's like all their energy is going to. Then they'll start eating and packing on actual meat. Right. But you'll notice like female blue crabs, I don't know if it is the same with dungeness, but female blue crabs will get their shells harder, like twice as fast as a male. because the only time a female crab is going to shed, a female blue crab is going to shed,

or is, yeah, is going to shed is when they shed from an immature female to a mature female. And then that's the only one time they're going to mate in their whole life. Is when they are a mature female soft crab. They're going to do it one time. But then after that, they're, like, their shells will get. That's when they mate. That's the one time they mate.

The one time they mate. So when they're an immature female, we call them a sally. Yeah. Right? And so it'll be a little crab like, you know, maybe that big, and they have a pyramid-shaped apron. And you can tell that that immature female is going to shed into a mature female because their apron will get like a purple pink hue. Okay. So that's when the, that's basically when they're in heat, right?

Yeah. So the big dominant male crabs will go, and we call them doublers. They'll double up on these little sallies and carry them around on their belly for like a couple weeks and defend them. What? And then all the big crabs were fighting with each other. That crab grabs onto that girl crab and totes her around. A couple weeks. Fighting off other guys.

Mm-hmm. Yep. And she kind of goes along with it? Yeah, she's happy to be involved, I think. You know. I have a little defense. I never knew this, man. Really?

Yeah, yeah. Is that common just across crabness? Or is that like a blue crab deal? I don't, I'll be honest. I'm not real familiar with anything but a blue crab. Yeah. I'm pretty dialed on the blue crabs, but besides that, I'm not really sure. He totes her around.

Yep, yeah, he'll tote her around. Basically, like I said, underneath them. Yeah, yep. But they'll, like, the crab, I don't know how it works, but I'm sure it's similar with animals. Like, I think that Sally's giving off something that, you know, indicates that she's in heat, right? So, like, we look at her fins to tell a peeler crab like that, we'll look at their inside second swim fin, and they'll have a white line at first. We call it a white sign. it'll go to orange and then red.

Once they're red, we say they're rank. Which means they're going to shed the next day or two. That's how we tell a peeler on the boat, which will shed no salt crab. One minute. Is a peeler good or bad for you? A peeler's good for me. So you're allowed to keep a female that hasn't bred yet? Yeah.

Okay. Yeah. Just generally all year long. Yeah. The size changes. It starts at three inches across the top of the carapace. And then at July 16th, he goes to three and a quarter inches, I believe, or three and a half inches across the time. I don't mean to keep bringing.

For the Sally, you know, for me for a peeler. Yeah. Normal blue crab starts at five inches, goes to five and a quarter. For keepers. I got to have you see that again. Yeah. Okay. So that crab's coming up, getting bigger, bigger, bigger.

And then she gets where she's going to molt or shed. And then she's going to get the guy's going to carry around breed her. and then she's going to turn into, like, then she's going to breed, produce eggs. Yeah. And then she's going to live for how long after that? I don't really know. But she just is hanging out and is never going to have babies again. No, no, no, no.

So she'll carry, you know, she'll carry around with her the whole time after they've bred, you know, for the rest of her life. Oh. She, like, has, like, delayed implantation or something version. Basically, yeah, yeah, yeah. So they only, they do the deed one time. That's what I was blowing my mind. Yeah. It's a common misconception that they'll only slunge one time. Yeah. And then she will, she's set for the rest of her life. Yeah, yeah. The rest of her life. Yep, yep. And so she'll sponge up.

I've always heard six to eight times, you know, but who knows? I don't really know. How old is the old crab? I mean, I don't, I mean, I don't really know for sure, but I would, I think they say in old crabs, like four years old. Okay. You know. But the thing that usually kills a crab besides getting caught is they go to shed and they can't shed. They don't have the energy. So like male crabs just keep getting bigger, bigger, bigger. But a female crab, since they only shed from an immature to a mature female one time, once she's a mature female, she'll never shed again. Okay. So she'll never grow. So if she's that big is a mature female, she'll stay that big. Is that right? Is that right? Yeah. Yeah. And then they'll sponge up so they get like, I'm sure you've seen them

before. When you pull the tail thing back and there's like eggs in there? What do you mean? Yeah. Well, so like on a blue crab, her apron, right, on the bottom, she'll get this big sponge on it. I've seen that on those blue crabs. Yeah. Like I keep picturing dungies.

That's just kind of the crab I mess with. Yeah. I keep picturing dungies, but I know what you're talking about. Yeah. Yeah. So they'll get like a big egg sponge. They say it's, you know, two to eight million eggs per sponge. Yeah.

When they're really bright orange, they're new. She'll carry around for like two weeks. As time goes on, they'll get darker in color. And by the time they drop off, they're like real dark, like brown, almost black. They'll drop off as larvae. And then they kind of float around in the tide. And then those larvae are going to, like, change kind of like their form, like 20. There's almost like 20 different stages before they even start to look like a blue crab, right?

And then once they start to look like a blue crab, then they're shedding once a week, you know, once every two weeks, whatever. you know, just until they get to a certain size, like maybe half the size of your thumb, something like that. And then, you know, they're shedding less and less frequently as they get older. Yeah. But they're trying to like, it's like they're, it's a sprint to get as big as you can so you don't get eaten. Right, you know what I mean? And then once they get to a certain size, then they're a little safer and they're only going to shed a few times a year.

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Search video podcasts and tap watch Well it's here folks The 2026 Meat Eater Auction House of Oddities Is back and open for bids now. This year's auction features eyebrow-raising outdoor gear donated by the meat eater crew, employees, and friends of the brand, including Steve's dad's shitty old truck, full of badass hunting gear, the Honda Outboard Motor from DOS Boat Season 3, Clay Newcomb's Alaskan Wetsuit Bearhide,

fly fishing memorabilia from the personal collection of Lefty Cray and more. The auction house kicks off July 8th and runs for two weeks with 100% of proceeds going to our land access initiative, which to date has helped fund new public land acquisitions, such as the recent 200-acre Tuckertown acquisition in North Carolina, the 328-acre Wildcat Bend acquisition in Montana, and the 215-acre Shilaw Pond Project in Maine. Visit the meat eater.com slash auction to place your bids now, get your hands on some meat eater history, and become a meaningful part of our next public land access campaign so what when you're what's the most valuable one you can catch and I got another question for you what the hell's this like I know what a soft shell is

he just explained it but right that's good for you or bad for you that's got be good for you right yes so soft shells are good for us you know I can sell them for a bunch of money individually okay they're like a delicacy you know where we're at but the best soft shell crabs I get are crabs that I catch as a peeler and then I put into tanks and then I monitor the tanks and then pull them out as a saw as like a perfect soft crab because they I got they're not a soft crab like a little bit like a semi aquaculture deal yeah something like that you know so I got like tanks and all that where I I bring them in and put them in the tank and then you know check on them like every couple hours because once every couple hours

yeah man like once a crab sheds you only have like two hours to get it before it's you know too hard to be a soft crab, too soft to be a hard crab. It's ours? Oh yeah. Oh, yeah, dude. Like, when we get these pillar runs, we're up all night, you know? We're up checking tanks. I got, like, cameras in my shedding tanks and all,

so I can see when they're shedding and all that stuff. No way. Yeah, dude. I mean, I'm married to the game. But they're not, synced up. They're not, like, synchronized, though. Is there a way to synchronize them? They're not necessarily synchronized,

but I've noticed that there is definitely cycles where they will all shed it one time. It's kind of weird, and I don't know exactly what it is. You know, a lot of people claim moon phase, a lot of people claim tide, all this kind of stuff. But, you know, they're in an isolated tank. You know, it's not like I'm keeping them in a live box. They're in an isolated tank, and they're still somehow kind of all in the same cycle. And a lot, in a lot of ways. It's kind of weird.

I don't even know what makes a shit like that. It's like calving season, man, for like. Yeah, every two hours. Are you serious? Yeah, man. How many those, how many those things? I don't want to ask you question, like, how much is in your bank account? But how many of those things you can, how many you put in a tank at a time?

I mean, I just built new tanks this year, but I mean, I can put a couple hundred in a tank. Okay. So I usually have different tanks. And as they're in different stages of shedding, I will move them into different tanks because they will kill each other. You know, so if you have one that's too, remember how I said a white sign earlier, it's got that white line. So, you know, that crab's still got a couple days until it sheds, but especially the immature females, they're the meanest.

Like, if you have them in a tank as a white sign, she's too early with a bunch of males that are going to shed, she'll just go around and kill them all. Eat them or kill them? They just kill them. I don't, they don't eat them. They don't eat them when they're going to shed. Like, we never, people are always like,

what do you feed them in the tanks? We don't feed them anything. They, well, I've put different stuff in there just to see if they'll eat it, and they never do. The only thing they'll kill and eat is each other sometimes. So when you go in and get a, when you go into, when you're out in that neck of the woods and you go in and you see in a restaurant soft shell crab, there's a better chance that some dude hatched that thing in a tank and plucked it at just the right moment.

Yeah. Then there is that you caught it in a pot. Yeah, I mean, we do catch some in the pots, but, you know, a lot of times they're pretty beat up, you know, and they don't make it to, you know, be in a live. soft crab or something like that. A lot of times those ones will go to either fish bait or be cleaned and frozen, you know, sold as a frozen soft crab. Got it.

Because, you know, you pull up a pot and you got one soft crab. We try to be really careful with them. You know, like if I pull a pot, you know, I can usually tell which ones, you know, if there's a soft crab in there as soon as it breaks the surface. And if there is, you know, I'm going to open up the pot. I'm going to try to, you know, Jimmy the other crabs around and reach up in there and try to get her out of there, you know, without her getting tore up because that pot is the surface and it's game on. All of them crads are just locked on to each other and they're, you know, they're

pissed. They don't know what's going on. They're all, yeah, they just get stressed and they're all fighting each other. So, but like they see a soft crab in there and they're just whew-whew-you-know-it- You know what I mean? It's like, oh, no, they just killed 10 bucks. It's a bummer. So, so tell me, like, because a lot of this is new to me, walk through the, the Different crabs you heart. Okay. So there's, there's just, there's got to be somewhere in here. We'll start with this.

There's like the big old male, hard ass shell. That's like a crab. Yeah. You mean like the kind of the different grades. Yeah, yeah. All right. So on my boat, we're calling crabs, like sorting them. We call it calling.

Yeah. Into, we got extra large males, right? And then we have. And that'd be like what, like if you go to, if you're steaming crabs, you're dumping them out on the table and everybody's picking crabs and eating that's who they're eating. Well, if you got, you know, if you just spent a bunch of money, if you spent $150, $200 a dozen.

Okay. Yeah. That's a high grade crab. It's like, you know, the X-Ls and the jumbo's. And how big are they point to point? Those, you know, I'll call mine at like six and three-quarter inches. Oh, so big. That's big, you know, and that's an expensive crab.

It's high dollar. But, you know, we're not catching much of those. So like, for instance, we might catch, you know, like the other day with 30 bushel crabs, two bushel of those were excels. Okay, so that's one grade. Yeah, that's like top tier. That's what I'm looking for. You know, I try to take as good a care of them as I possibly can.

That makes you most happy. Yeah, exactly. I love seeing a big, nice, big, black crab come with them up in the pot. And then we have our number ones. Okay, you back up one sec? Yeah. What's that big ass crab worth? I sell them at my place live, 100 bucks a dozen.

And I could get more. I mean, in the times of the year when we have, like the really big giant crabs, like you just see them, you're like, holy smokes, that's a giant. You know, I'll get a hundred fifty bucks a dozen. But we might get two dozen a day. And people are buying those to throw down, like on a nice party, dinner, kind of thing like that. You know, people are like, 150 bucks a dozen, that's insane.

You know what, I've never been stuck with one single time, $150 a dozen crabs, man. They're the first to go. I mean, people line up to go, try to pay $150 bucks. But they comment on it. Yeah, oh yeah, everybody's got something to say about it. And it's kind of funny because like there's some people that are just like in a position to do that. And there's other people that like it's almost like Marilyn Brake. It's almost like bragging rights.

People are like, I paid 150 bucks. You know, these, I paid 150 bucks a dozen for these ones. You know what I mean? I knew a guy to get crabs like that. So it's expensive but they sell. Yeah, I mean like you can't go into a restaurant and get crabs that are that grade even if you're paying more. Like those are the crabs we call them the, the, uh, the, uh, you know, the, uh, you can't. the know-a-guy crabs, you know?

Oh, really? You got to know a guy to get crabs like that. You know what I mean? Okay. Yeah. So then we have our number ones, which is like the primary, that's the biomass I want to target, is your number ones. And that is your, we call them it five and three-quarters to six-and-three-quarters.

But that's your, like, market-sized crab. Uh-huh. That's what I'm shooting for is to get the most amount of those. That's the bread and butter crab. That's the bread and butter crab. That's, I got good margins on those crabs. They live pretty good. They fill up baskets.

You know, that's a large, you know. And that's the crabs that you're probably going to see at a crab feast or something. If it's just your buddies, you know. And then the next tier would be number. And those are going for how much a dozen? I think right now I'm at $70 a dozen on them. And like $400 bucks a bushel, which is six dozen crabs. Damn, 400 bucks a bushel?

Yeah. Cost a lot to catch him. Well, no, I'm not hacking on the market. I just one time we went out, we had, I don't know how many guys, we had enough guys in the boat that we went out with one of them long lines. Is that when you were sick of deer hunting or something? I think I seen that. And we had like a bushel.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. It was cool. Yeah. Yeah, it was no joke. I mean, but pulled up a bushel. Yeah. So that's 400 bucks for the crabs. Yeah.

In today's prices, whatever. Yeah, for me, I mean, a lot of places are a lot more and some places are cheaper. Yeah, got it. I never claim to have the cheap. as crabs. And those go to, are you, you have restaurant clients? No. Not anymore. I used to. It's all consumers. I sell all my stuff direct to consumer now, but that's very uncommon. I know, but within that, isn't that direct to consumer, there's no, like, there's no consumer for you that just happens to like use some crab in a restaurant. It's like people taking it home to eat it.

You know, they can do whatever they want with them. You know, how they buy them? But they're priced out of being middle-maned. And that's almost a little bit of that's on purpose. You know what I mean? Yeah, I got you. So it's at a price point where you're not going to have somebody. If somebody were to be buying those crabs for a restaurant, there would be no margin.

Although I do have cases where, you know, I've had people that have restaurants or something like that, and they'll come and pay whatever because they, you know, they want to be like, oh, yeah, we got crabs from the crabs. You know what I mean on YouTube or whatever. So just the way like just the you've developed a certain market you serve a certain clientele where you're just out of the restaurant business and you're selling two people serving food to their friends and families. Yeah yeah, yep, yep. And you know I used to sell to restaurants and things like that but once you go to selling your own crabs you almost get blacklisted in a way, you know what I mean?

So you know I had been selling to restaurants and purveyors for like seven years, you know, and I had built good reputation, you know, I had a lot of contacts. Exactly. So you go to sell your own and they don't want to buy from you. Yeah. Because, yeah, your competition, but also they're always going to assume that you're going to be skimming the better grade off the top. Oh, is that right? Yeah, exactly. That's really the big thing. You know what I mean? Which, like, I truthfully never did because I was like, you know, I was in a, in a position when I started where like there was no market for me so I had to like be

you know I had no family in market I hadn't you know I had nothing so I had to like have a little bit of an edge on the other guys so like I always I never did that and I always sold like you know I was like a try hard I was trying to sell like a better product than the other guys yeah which I know now like kind of screws up the market status quo you know what I mean but also at the time it's like I did what I had to do to get a foot in you know but yeah I mean I sell everything direct to consumer now, which is, I say it's like three times the money for five times the work. Yeah. You know, I mean, because you're, it used to be I'd catch crabs and you drop

them off to the, dude, you're done. Yeah, yeah. You know, I'd be driving around the truck for two, three hours, you know, after work, but it's like, I didn't have to worry about it. I tacked up a, you know, a ticket. I picked up a check on Monday, you know, and like, we were just throwing crabs into baskets. We're like, yeah, the more they die, the more they buy, right? You know what I mean? But now I'm like, oh my gosh, like we got, you know, like every crab goes in the basket up right. I mean, we've always tried to do that. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. We've always tried to, you know, take good care of the product, obviously.

But, you know, it's just kind of the joke. It's like, now I'm like, now I catch them on a Monday or Tuesday. I'm like, all right, now I got to keep this thing alive until Saturday. We're only open two days at the retail spot. So, okay, so we got the XLs. Is that what you call them? Yep, XS. And you got the bread and butter crab.

Number one. Number one. Number one. My favorite crab. Okay. And then we got number twos, which are going to be your smaller crab. This doesn't matter. Like, at this point, these are all males.

Yes, all males. Okay. And that's going to be, like, well, before the 16th, five-inch crab to five-and-three-quarter-inch crab. And you just know it when you're looking at it. You're not putting them all the caliber. For the most part. For the most part. I mean, we do have sticks, obviously.

We're putting them to the stick and all when we got to. But, you know, for the most part, I mean, I've seen enough crabs. pretty much just call them by eye. So we got number twos. Those are going to be our smaller crabs, but so remember number twos, number ones and excels, these are all crabs that are better grade. They're all hard. Okay, so like we squeeze them, shells are hard, crabs full of meat. And then we'll have light crabs. We call them trash crabs in the industry. This is another grade. Another grade, which is what we call a straight call, which means if it's legal, it goes in the same basket. All the same sizes get mixed, right, on a straight call.

Yeah. But it's going to be, we call them lights when we sell them. In the industry, we call them trash crabs. So it'll be a straight call of trash crab, which is the crabs. I got confused. We need a chart. It's because it's a size issue or is it something different? It's something different.

So it's when you squeeze them. A big crab can be a trash crab. Yeah. That's when we squeeze them right. And so we can tell that they've shed, but they haven't yet filled their new shell Yeah, but so even if he was... If he's eight inches, he's going in the light basket. If he's five and a quarter, he's going in the same basket.

I got you. That's what we call a straight call. And then they're all just the same value. It's just a per pound or whatever. Dollar of crab, maybe. Oh, that's how that goes. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So we don't, okay, so I don't keep a lot of lights usually.

You're pitching back. Yeah, which is very uncommon. But also it's because I don't have, I'm my own market for lights. You know what I mean? and I try to keep the value of the product up. And I have some customers that prefer light crabs, right? They're easy to pick. They're super cheap.

You're great for kids and things like that. But my kind of outlook on it is like you can only kill a crab one time, right? Sure. And I would much rather throw that crab back and give him a chance to kill him when he's worth a $10. Yeah, a $10 crab instead of a dollar crab. But if I came to you begging for a basket, lights, you'd oblige me. Yeah, yeah.

I mean, they don't live real good to walk in either. So we'll usually keep like two bushel on a Friday. Just because I have some regulars that, like, they prefer those crabs. So knowing you're going to sell over the weekend on a Friday, you'd keep something. Yeah, I'd keep a couple. But I ain't, you know, I'm not keeping, I ain't going to keep 10 bushel of them on a Monday. You're just going to kill them for nothing, you know. There's no sense in killing them for no reason.

And even, like, taking them to a picking house or something like that, I mean, what are you going to unload them for? you know, nothing, like $20, $15, $20 for a bushel of crabs. I mean, got it. It seemed to me it's a little counterintuitive when you could try to, you know, catch them as a $400. If you let two of them, if you let that whole bushel go, and two of them, two or three of them come back to you as ones, slacks or whatever. Yeah, it was worth.

And it was less work. Yeah, there's your money. Right. Okay, so that's another grade. And then we got females. And then we sort females just into mediums. and larges. We don't get a ton of them little tiny, mature females. You can only keep a female if it's a mature female. Okay. And there's no size limit across the carapest, you know, no point

to point limit size on a female crab. It's just if it's a mature female crab, you can take it. So not everybody, but I have a license for it. There's the mesh on the pot such that it's already sort in itself. So in a lot of ways, yes. So crabs, male crabs under five inches are going overboard. Okay. Most of the time, lights are going overboard. Okay. Immature females that are not peelers are going overboard, although that's kind of uncommon. Any light females, we don't keep any light females.

Because remember how I said the females, their shells get harder twice as fast, but they're twice as empty inside, you know. But yes, so in the pots, I have different mesh size wire. Yeah. And that does a lot of the cull in forests. Yeah, yeah. And then we also have call rings, which are plastic rings in the sides of the pods. I've seen those, yeah. Yeah, and so I have different size call rings that I open up at different times of the year.

I got it. You know what I mean? Because like right now, we had that mailshed early this year. And so there's just a load of crabs, but there's a load of these cookie cutter, like four and three quarter and five to five and a half inch little males. And so that's a legal crab, right? You know, five and a half inch crab, illegal crab, but I don't want to dump 30 of those in the box and they have to go through 30 of them each pot.

You know, it's going to slow everybody down. You're getting dead up. So you use the right rings. Yeah, I put bigger rings in there so I'll, you know, I can let a legal crab out. But I'm not real interested in catching twos. I'd rather catch a pot with three ones than a pot with 10 twos, you know, any day.

It's less work to call through them. You know, they're not getting pinched up. Little crabs will kill big crabs in the pot. And once little crabs go in, big crabs don't want to go in there. You know what I mean? Like big crabs trap big crabs, little crabs, little crabs. And females kill everything. They don't trap any males.

Yeah, mature females, they usually run together in a pack, so you'll pull pot's got 30 of them. And they're killing males. No, male goes in there. He's dead, dude. They're going to tear him up. God, man. You'd like to ask him why they're doing it.

competition or something? I don't know, man. They're just vicious. They're unassuming. You know what I mean? I think they lure them in there and then kill them. Really? They got some got a vendetta, I guess, or something.

I don't know. Daddy issues, I guess. So these dudes, like, the dudes that work for you? Do you got the same guys all the time? Or is it just like a, are they like freelance camera guys? You just go grab one or grab one. And a lot of ways are like freelance camera guys. That's a joke.

A lot of times they're like freelance camera guys. But, like, right now, I'm very fortunate to have a good crew, which, you know, some of these guys have been with me for a while, multiple years. Okay. That's pretty uncommon in a lot of ways. You know, I've done a lot of years where you were just trying to get anybody that'll show just warm bodies, you know. And it's, it's honestly what's getting a lot of guys out of the industry is the extreme lack of help. Yeah. The rising cost of operation.

But, you know, it's just, it's a pain to try. to train a new guy you know sure man my sister you got your own way you like it and they they did it on another boat but that's not how you like it done yeah but there's only one way to do it's the way you know what i mean on my boat at least um so i've put a lot of time into trying to dial the system you know and make basically the system a like almost like an assembly line right with interchangeable parts yeah is you know and people are the parts so i try to make every job of the job of on the boat every step, something that basically a monkey could do if need be.

You know what I mean? It's great, deaf skilled guys. Yeah, and then all the guys learn the different roles and so if you jump into blank roll or whatever. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So they kind of work their way up the totem pole. They're going to start as usually a stacker. So they're going to be pulling the pots out of that hot water tank,

stacking them three high, pushing them to the back of the boat. It's kind of the low man on the totem pole job. And then I would say, depending on the boat, in the area, your second guy is either going to be your call man, you know, the guy that's sorting crabs or your shaker. For me, like in the upper bay, it's always been a shaker. But like, you go to other areas and they regard their second mate or their first mate as their caller, you know? Oh, I would think that. Because they're in charge of their grave, right?

Yeah, like then, yeah. And that's what I don't know, based on, based on me knowing nothing, I would think that that would be like the, that'd be the important job. Yeah, it is. you know, and when I sold a market, it was a more important, to me it was more important to have a more skilled guy on there. Because you weren't giving them a second look. Right. But now, you know, I can afford a little bit of buffer in that area because, you know,

we're the only ones touching the crabs and they're going to call them on the boat. And then my guys at the crab stand are also going to go through them as well. Exactly. And so that'll afford me some days if I got a mixed-max crew or, you know, something like that, I know, well, maybe I could pull, you know, if we got to make a lot of, make up some time. Maybe I could pull my guy off the call box, put them on the rail to shake, you know, put a guy that maybe doesn't know quite as much on there to just to get through them. And then, you know, I'll just let the guys to the stand know, you know, I'll tag them and say,

you know, just pay attention when you go through these, you know, particular attention and make sure the gray's right on them. What's the average age of a crew guy in the industry? In the industry, I don't know, man. I mean, you'll have, you got a lot of high school kids. college age kids, that's what I have mostly. But then also there's some straight lifers, we call them. You know what I mean? Guys that are, you know, they look like they're 100, but they're probably like 35. So maybe you someday.

Yeah. I mean, I'm definitely a lifer, but I mean, you know, for the crew, it tends to attract not all the time, but, you know, it is common that it attracts a certain crowd of folks. Yeah. And maybe our don't already have a job, you know what I mean? maybe they got more toes and teeth a lot of times. They may have a habit that, you know, requires them to make quick money with physical labor. You know what I mean?

It doesn't require bringing your own equipment except yourself. Yeah. Yeah. You know. You've heard the chaos. Now you can see it. Hello. My gosh.

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and the 215-acre Shilohan Project in Maine. Visit themeatheater.com slash auction to place your bids now, get your hands on some meat eater history, and become a meaningful part of our next public land access campaign. Because you allow so much visibility through video and other stuff, if you allow so much visibility into your, how you get your product and sell your product. Yeah. Do crew guys come to you?

Like, because they want a job. Yeah. Yeah, they do. And it's kind of funny, because like, I used to have endless problems with getting crew. Now I have endless amounts of people that want to help, but as the stuff online has grown, I keep the circle a lot tighter.

I got it. Like, you ain't getting a job on the boat because mostly just some, guy that wants to say he did it or some guy that wants to, you know, I'm always paranoid, like, you know, they're never going to want to try to sue you or something, you know. I'm with you. You get guarded. Yeah, I'm very guarded. So, like, if you want a job on the boat, I either have to be real desperate or you got to know somebody that's already helping me or something like that. I do a fair amount of vetting, you know, just because, you know, that or it's some

kid that just wants to put it all over his Snapchat story that he's going to know. And he's not going to be any good anyway. So I try to find out crew members that are like not interested in what I, you know, not, not interested in the, in video and whatever else. Yeah, yeah, they're not trying to be like a crab celebrity. Exactly. They're there for the income, not the outcome. You know what I mean? Let's talk about the infrastructure a minute. So you said you got a trot line boat that you keep for crew guys to use or whatever. Yeah. You got your main, you got one main boat.

Yeah, we're building another one right now. But yes, one main one that we're running. All them tanks, retail location. Yeah. And, you know, 1,500 crab pots sitting in my front yard. 1500 crabs pots. That's what I'm saying. Like, it's got to be, I mean, I don't know, I'm getting, I mean, like, for capital investment.

Yeah, that ain't worth it. In a lot of waste, you got. For capital investment, is it more or less than buying like a sweet house in your town? I mean, it would be probably not everybody's rigs created equal. but I mean, we could just go through some kind of numbers on, on, you know, in terms of equipment. So, you know, I got a commercial 900 pot license. Oh, yeah, you got to buy that thing. Yeah.

I bought mine a lot cheaper because it was a long time ago. But, I mean, now I would say that license is probably worth $30,000. And then you got to pay $2,000 a year to hold it to the state. So we got like $30,000 there. And then, you know, if you were like my boat, it's not worth a load of money. The new boat I'm building is, you know, the new boat that I'm building that I probably will never, hopefully have to build another one. By the time it's all said and done, it'll be like a quarter million bucks.

Okay. Crab pots, $52 a piece finished out. So I got 1,500 of those. I have another commercial license, a 300 pot license that I hold. So that one's probably worth $10,000, $15,000. Do you fish that one or you just hold it? No, we'll run them both on the boat sometimes when there's limits. Okay.

Because you can keep two limits with two license. I got you. You know, we got a retail location that I own, you know, a piece of commercial property that I own with a little stand on it. We got refrigerator trailers. We got trucks, you know, boats. There's a lot of infrastructure. But it's stuff you just accumulated, though.

Yeah, it's mostly stuff that I built out of whatever was around. Got it. You know, because the thing is with crab and it's like the margins ain't they. to go and, you know, buy all the stuff and just go, you'd like, it would take you forever to make your money back. You get something, you make a little money, you use it to buy parts, kind of assembled together, and then all these years later, what, like 12 years later or something, you sit back, you're like, damn.

Yeah, you got the whole deal. But it's like, it's because, you know, it started, went out one day and to start laying down down cash. No, I mean, that would never make any sense. Yeah, exactly. So it's like, and see, and that's another reason is generational a lot of times. it's because these guys, you know, the sun gets into it and he doesn't have to go buy a $100,000 boat and he doesn't have to buy a license, you know. Yeah.

Or if he does, you know, they have a lot of that back-in infrastructure. They have markets already in line, you know. Some guys, there are some guys out there fighting the good fight and just kind of building it out, but it's very uncommon these days. Just because it's such a grind, you have to reinvest every bit of capital, every bit of work. You know, you have to make up for your deficit with just basically unpaid labor of yourself. You know what I mean? It's like cattle ranching in the West where you have this like diminishing number

of generational ranching families. Yeah. But there's a romance to having a ranch. So now people make money in tech. They make money in oil. That's how crab it is, man. Yeah, they make money. Oh, really?

Yeah, they're like, oh, I want to retire and go crabbing. And I'm like, oh, that's a thing in crabbing? Oh, man. And I always say, I'm like, you're lucky to retire from grabbing. Then they like buy a ranch, identify as a rancher. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But the ranch doesn't make money,

and they made their money elsewhere, but they, like, get to pretend to be a rancher. I was going to say in crabbing, there's, there's, that's not a relaxing occupation. People, yeah, but there's a misconception. People, like, romanticize, you know, the whole, they'll want to retire into being a crabber. Yeah, and I'm like, dude, you're lucky to, you know,

crabbers don't retire. Like, you're lucky to retire as, you know, from crab and they die. They think it's quaint? Oh, yeah, no, they think, you know, they think of the pictures of the sunsets and the, you know, the sound of the end. engines going out. So romanticized. Yeah. And I mean like meanwhile I'm like half those people you've seen there, they're freaking high. You know what I mean? Like they're going out to get their butt kicked. You know what I mean? Seriously. I had no idea people would think that that'd be like a like a quaint occupation. Yeah. And it's kind of it's like there's not many guys getting into it and a lot of the guys getting into it or like guys like that. Do they last? No. We actually don't mind it because I'm like they go out and buy a bunch of nice stuff. You know, they're buying all new pots. They're paying all new pots. They're paying. whatever, they're just writing checks for it.

And we always got a joke. We're like, keep an eye on that one because two years we're buying our, I'm going to buy his rig, I promise. You know, we're like making bets. We're like, two years, a boat could be mine. You know what I mean? I'm going to, I'm going to go get his number because he's going to need to unload that license in three years.

You know what that year? I'll be getting all that year at a half price. A hundred percent because they're going to be like, this is a hot disaster. You know, I'm, you know, best way to, you know, become a millionaire crabbing store with two million. You know what I mean? Start of two million bucks. You could be one millionaire, craver.

You know what I mean? Yeah, it's interesting. Like it's a bunch of, you know, not everybody, but it's a lot of, you know, rich kids or, you know, guys that think they're going to retire and get into craven. And it's just funny to watch because it's like they go in there and they're all like, oh, yeah, I'm not going to let anybody push me around. I'm going to be the guy.

And it's like, all right, buddy. Good luck. But you got to just like, you got to just be the kind of person that could just work, though, dude. Yeah, you got to, I'm telling you, man, you got to be a little stubborn. Like, you know, it literally, that's why I didn't mind the musky fishing yesterday. Because I was like, I'm literally, I made a living doing this, doing the same thing over and over and over and over, expecting the, expecting a different result. Like, literally, the definition of insanity is crap.

You know what I mean? Like, you'll go crazy. Like, and I am a little crazy. Like, you just, you got to, we joke, but like, You got to be a little nutty to, you know, just go do that. How long do you think you'll do it? I'm really trying to set myself up to be able to do it as long as I want to and as long as my body will allow.

But does it get, like, do you, how old are you? 30. Okay. So let's jump. Like, when you're 40, are you still on the boat every day? That's my goal. Really? Which is kind of the opposite of a lot of guys.

And then you're just like the kind of dudes sitting back. Like with the calculator? Not really. I like doing it. You want to just keep doing it? I love doing it. Yeah, I love doing it. Okay.

I, yeah, I love doing it. So you don't aspire to, you don't aspire to get off the water because your system's so dialed and you got such a good marketing apparatus? My goal is to not get off of the water. Like my goal is to be able to do it, but also, you know, I'd like to be in a spot where, you know, if I have a family someday, you know, family someday or you know I have health issues or something I'm married oh you're married okay yeah but no kids not yet no but I have things in place where like I don't have to go out there if I don't necessarily want to you know what I mean like just in terms of like you know a lot of guys there's no other option man like they're they are literally dying

out there they're in their 60s and 70s because they've never set anything up on the back end and or they just really want to do it you know but a lot of lot of them like they got no other option man so they go until they can't you know a lot of them have health issues and things like that and i've grown up being a younger guy significantly younger guy in the industry i've grown up and seen a lot of that and i've seen a lot of these older guys get sick and then getting hit hard spots because they got nothing they got no insurance they got nothing else they can't go to work you know they suffer their family suffers so like my goal was always to get it to a point where like i love the water i love being out there i love crabbing

but if something, you know, my body, I don't, you know, I don't want to run my body into oblivion just to have to pay my mortgage. Where's your first run into your wife? My wife is actually from Lancaster, Pennsylvania, and I met her because my mom and stepdad and moved to Lancaster. The end of my junior high school, they moved there. And I wasn't 18, so I had to move with them. I lived there in cornfields for a couple months. until I turned 18 and then moved back to Maryland as soon as I could.

And you met her when you were there? She was the neighbor. Okay, what's she thinking of the whole crabbing thing? She likes it? She goes out on the boat with you and stuff? Occasionally. It's kind of funny because like, you know, when I met her when we were like 17, I was like,

yeah, I'm moving back to Maryland, like, you know, I'm gonna go be a craver and she's like, what the heck is that even mean? And then we ended up getting married like 10 years later, you know what I mean? Just like, it wasn't part of the program, Land-Caster. She was just like, what?

Yeah, yeah, yeah, no, dude. It was kind of a wrench in my... But she don't mind you being in that business. No. No, she don't mind it. But, you know, but she don't mind it, but she also... You know, she got into this understanding, with an understanding that you're married to it.

You know what I mean? Like, you marry me, you marry the life. Yeah, because you're pretty clear about what you were going to do. Yeah, yeah. And she's always known me as that. And so, you know, she's always been very supportive of it, which is great. That's important, I think, because it's a lifestyle, man.

I mean, like I said, this year, this week is the first time I've ever been away in the middle of summer. No, that's what we were literally. Me and some of the guys were laughed about, they were talking about you were on FaceTime or something with your crew trying to sort through some issues and stuff. We're in the middle of like the fishing tournament. Because they're out working and you're not there? Yeah, yeah, yeah. This is the first time my crew's ever gone and anybody's ever gone on my boat without me. What time do you guys hit the water when you're out?

4.30. Okay, 4.m. Yeah. You usually meet at 4.30. Sometimes when it's like stupid hot, we'll go earlier. Later in the season, like October, it's, you know, we're meeting it because the sunrise doesn't, sunrise is later. We'll meet later and we can only crab from half an hour before sunrise, eight hours after that. We can haul gear.

By regulation? By regulation, yeah. Because if not, then guys would just go out and fish as many pots as they, you know, they go fish a thousand pots in a day if they could go all day and night. Oh, huh. That's interesting. keeps it a little bit humane too for the crew i guess so yeah here's here's the last a couple questions just last thing i want to explore with you like you're thinking about you're talking about okay you're 40 years old whatever is is like is that resource so well managed that you can

kind of comfortably plan on a future of crabbing or is there anxiety about the resource From management issues, from disease issues, from climate issues, you know what I mean? Or is it like there's always been crabs, there will always bee crabs. They're very, you know, they're robust. No, there's definitely management concerns, which is what has pushed me to diversify my business in the way that I have. Really? With the social media and with the retail and all those kinds of things, you know. So like, and I like that you said not just the resource itself, you know,

people don't think we're just like pirates out there. But like, you know, with the management of it, with this and that, with environmental and ecological changes and all those kinds of things, as all factor into like what you're saying. And yes, I have concern with that. You know, a lot of the laws and things like that and the fluctuating crab populations and outside market too.

You know, that's why I've gone to selling my own because it was kind of like farming before where I didn't set the product or the price for my own product. I wanted to have a little bit more control over the price my own product. Is that a volatile market? Yeah, definitely. I mean, because now, like, shipping's gotten so good that, you know, a lot of our 80% of the crabs sold in Maryland are coming out of Louisiana. And then our crab meat market, you know, the pick meat is overseas. You know, a lot of that is a different species of crab that's just like our crab that's being picked and shipped

over from overseas. Hold on a, man, shipped to you. Not to, I mean, I don't sell it. No, no, not you, but you mean, like, you're in Maryland. You think you're in like blue, blue, Blue crab country. You're probably eating a Venezuelan blue swimmer crab. What? If you eat, if you buy something. If you don't know what you're doing, you just went into whatever and bought some crab, you're not even getting crabs from local dudes.

There's a chance you are, but if that crab cake is less than $35, there's a good chance it's not from this country. So we, you know, in our area, right, in Maryland, a lot of the eastern shore, a lot of those lower grade crabs would all go to picking house, right? And then those crabs are getting sold. generally by the pound of the picking house, and then they are picking those crabs by hand and pasteurizing the meat. And then that used to be the crab meat market, right?

And so that gave us something to do with every crab that came over the rail. But nowadays, it's not really like that. So I wanted the retail spot to be able to kind of control my own market a little bit. You know, my theory is, like I said, you can only kill a crab one time. You may as well get it. Well, it's worth the most. And you kind of have to have value added to the product, I think. So I think the name of the game going forward for the future of the industry is getting

the most amount for everything that comes over the rail. And so for me, it's not only selling the crab, but also the story. So that's, like I said, you can only catch a crab once. You can sell the story time and time again. And it also helps with the marketing of the crab, you know, and all those kinds of things as well. feasibly in the future, like if you play your cards right, in the future, you could be processing half as many crabs but still making a living. That's what I'm doing now, really.

I mean, you know, obviously we're shooting video and things like that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But I've kind of, it really truly kills me. But I've had to dial my crab operation to scale it back a little bit. You know, instead of running 1,500 pots, we're running less than 1,000 now. Okay. Which is like super bizarre to me. I've never, I've always just gone, you know, five days a week and ran a load of gear.

But now, there's only one of me, you know, and I got a lot of hands and a lot of things. Right now that I'm trying to figure out how to do and build, I've kind of leaned more into the marketing side of the crabs. You know what I mean? Selling less crabs and getting better money for them, kind of premium money for them. Yeah. But it's also, you know, we sell a really good product. And a lot of people want to, there's a certain percentage of people that are less mindful of the price if they know exactly where it's coming from. Yeah, man.

So we kind of try to tell the story of that, a lot of transparency as to where your product comes from, what goes into catching that product. And then also giving people, you know, telling the story of the product and the people that catch it and the whole kind of how everything works. And, you know, there's, there's enough people out there that are, you know, really. interested in that and and they just like a good product they know our crabs come from maryland i don't buy crabs from out of state uh which is a real pain i know i could make a load more money if i did but i am just i'm committed to you know i'm not going to deceive people to try to make a couple extra bucks you know what i mean like kind of the schick that i have is that you know is the transparency part you know you know where it's coming from you can see it like we used to live stream

and ship crabs and so like i you know i'd write your name on a crab you get that crab two you know a week later. I've got I've got buddies, acquaintances, buddies, black cod, salmon, bison,

cattle, I could probably go on, that have adopted the model you're talking about of being like, here I am, here's how I do what I, here's how I produce my product,

you can come out, you can come to my ranch and look at it, you can come on my boat and look at it, here's the people that are, doing it there's this guy this guy this guy we go out here's how we catch what we do here's how we process what we do you can come visit the damn cow if you want right and in the end you buy what you know from people you know and you saw the whole thing happen yep and and all of them have achieved some level of liberty

through through the transparency of their operation they've achieved a level of freedom from the market yeah Meaning the oscillating stuff, they have a clientele, and it's a luxury or however you want to look at it, but they have a clientele that's like, it's worth a couple bucks to me to get it from you. Yeah, exactly. Because I like how you do it.

And I like the things you think about. Right, and I like the way you treat everything, and I'll just pay a couple bucks more. Yeah, and right now, that's where I'm, that's how I'm making it work. I don't know if it's always gonna be like that where that side of my business is going to go, but right now that's, you know, that's what we're doing. It's a lot more work, man, on the back end. I mean, you got to be 100% committed to everything,

and there's, you know, you're responsible for every part of that process now, you know, which is a humbling experience. You know, I, when I got into it, sell my own, I thought like, oh, man, all the crab buyers, they make all the money, you know what I mean? Like, and then you become the guy selling retail and you're like, holy crap, I got to keep these little bastards live all week. I've dealing with a bunch more people. I got a retail operation to keep up, you know, Facebook pages to run ads to make. You know, it's, I mean, it's nuts, man. It's like, you know, it's every, every part, you know, of the vertical integration you're responsible for, you know,

which is good in the long run, I think, but it takes a lot of time. There's a steep learning curve. But it's funny because, as you mentioned, like, you can come visit the cow. So my retail spot, the crab stand is, it's called Bokin, point seafood, but I, it was just a grass lot, right? So I started there just selling crabs out of the bed of my truck and I bought this little grass lot for cheap in the next town over. And I put some gravel down and then I got a refrigerator trailer I was selling out of that. And now, you know, especially since I've kind of leaned into the whole story of it to build a crab stand, I bought a like a 41 foot

like wooden crab boat. It was sunk and tore it all down and rebuilt, took the engine out, just decked the inside built a canopy and turned it into like my retail spot and then I dug a hole in the ground and put the boat into it so it looks like it's sitting on the water line and then we backed the fridge trailer up to it because everybody that would come to the crab stand was like had a story about cravers or their granddad was a craver and you know they used to buy them off the boat and everybody wanted to come see the boat and so that's not really feasible but I just thought it'd be cool to like bring the boat to the people so now you can and the boat's got a good story. You know, we tell the history, the family that owned the boat, you know, they've come and

visited it. Like, they're just really glad to see it not out to pasture, you know. So it's a little unique, but it's, it's one of those little things that people really like. You know what I mean? They like to be able to come and see an actual real legit wooden Deltaville built crab boat and then buy crabs off the boat, you know, you know, and take pictures with it and whatever. And it's a good landmark, you know what I mean? You can't miss the 41-foot crab boat buried in the ground. You know what it means? The only one of town. You get a landmark, you get some education.

Yeah, yeah. And I have stuff there that I've set up with, you know, different kinds of commercial fishing equipment just for people to look at and check out. You know, stuff like that. That's great, man. The whole thing's cool. So here's the last question for you. It's day three of the tournament.

I don't want to get into who's doing what and who's getting what. Day three of the tournament. Right. Every day there's different rules, different objectives, right? different fish you're supposed to catch. What's your... I'll tell you what I think. Then you can tell me.

All right. This is where I'm heading with this. Of all the days of the tournament, today's rule set is the most exciting to me. Yesterday's was the least exciting to me. Where do you sit? I... I don't know the rules for today.

You better find out. Right. That's what I'm saying. I've heard, like, a bunch of different things, so I don't know exactly what, you know, what is gospel here? It would be, I want to give you a tip, a competitor tip, friendly tip between competitors. Yeah. It would be very wise for you to dig in on the rules for today. Yeah.

Before you head out. Yeah, yeah, no doubt. I mean, we just... Because other days is pretty simple. Yeah, but, I mean, well, that's what I'm saying. Like, we've heard last I heard you were still making them up so you could, you know, still win it today. Listen, I want to be clear about something. I had nothing to do with these rules.

how you'd know that what I'm saying is true, I would never in a million years have made yesterday. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, yesterday was tough, man. I would never in a million years had made yesterday. I would never in a million years have made anything to do with muskies. Yeah, yeah. I'm anti-Musky.

Yeah. Anti-musky. I thought about that, but I was like, you know, I get it. We're at Lake of the Woods, and it's known for muskies. So it's like people would be bummed if you didn't involve them in some way. But also, if you were to make them like the main. course, you know, it would have been a real boring day. It would have been a real radio silence.

I mean, yesterday there wasn't much going on. Well, the evening, well, yeah, yeah. I mean, so today, could it be anybody's game? I think that today there's a lot of point opportunity today. It's a day where there's a lot of different specialties could come into play. A lot of different approaches and tactics could come into play. And it's a day where, like, the kind of guy that can go out and just catch a lot of kinds of fish, it's his day. Right.

This is not a specialist day. I'm glad to hear that. I get fish in the boat. It's hard to catch, like, dial on one thing. I'm going to fill in a boat. Yesterday was, like, the most specialist of all specialist days. Today is a generalist day. Yeah, good.

When it comes to hunting and fishing, I'm a generalist. Same. Jack of all trades, master, and none. Okay. That's what I like to hear. Yeah, exactly. When you're a crab specialist, but you're a generalist in your recreational pursuits. I have a doctorate in crabbing, but, you know, a minor and everything else. A minor and general.

General collecting of crustaceans and other various critters. Well, good luck for today. Appreciate it. You too, man. Thanks for having me. Yeah, man. Thanks for coming on. It's good to finally talk face to face and hang out a little bit, you know.

Yeah, I appreciate it. And good to hear about crabbing and good at tonight at the award ceremony. Hopefully I'll be the guy with a huge check. Yeah, yeah, right. We actually got a huge check. Did you actually? You actually got a big check. Just the actual big check.

Nice. That's cool. Who had to carry that on the plane? This is rolled up. Oh, nice. All right, man, thanks. Stay tuned. If you want to find out what happened with the fish eater classic, stay tuned.

It's going to be, videos are going to start dropping on YouTube. So just pay attention. Fish Eater Classic fishing tournament. filmed up here in beautiful Lake of the Woods, Ontario at the Crow Rock Lodge, which I would highly recommend to anyone that wants to come and have like a freshwater fishing bonanza. We ain't roughing it really. The food is really good.

I mean, this place. Dude, it's awesome. It's great fishing. Great resource, great fishing. Check it out. Crow Rock Lodge. Thanks, guys. Did you hear Phelps has teamed up with a bunch of,

of other high-end brands to do the Ultimate Elk giveaway. Anyone who is 18 or older can sign up to win an amazing gear package that includes a new rifle or bow along with great supporting gear. The winner will pick their rifle package or archery package. For every $25 spent, you get 10 additional entries. The sign-ups end July 26 at Phelpsgamecalls.com. This is an I-Heart podcast. Guaranteed human.