Crayfish Al Fredo Pizza w/Lobster Mushrooms

[pikestabber]

Trapped some crayfish last weekend and paired them with Lobster mushrooms I picked in July. Made for a darn tasty pizza

[Mike89]

looks real tasty!!

[Archerysniper]

yummy

[pushbutton]

Are those the rusties? Pain to clean? Seems like that would just be a good time......

[pikestabber]

They are Rusty's, PB. I guess I've trapped and cleaned them for a number of years, so you learn some shortcuts on cleaning. I'll sit down with a big bin and watch a Twins game and just get into a rhythm. After a while it becomes automatic and you can get a bunch done if you stick with it. I love to vacuum seal and freeze 1/2 pound packages of cleaned tail/claw meat and just use it wherever you'd normally use shrimp. Great tasting meat that I think has characteristics of shrimp, lobster, and crab...the best parts

And yes, crayfish trapping is one of my favorite activities and an absolute blast. If you get a lake with a good population, it's ASTONISHING how many you can trap in even a few hours. Dump traps, fish for 3-4 hours, pull traps, and away you go with enough for a big cajun boil with pleny of leftovers. The anticipation of what's happening with the traps makes even a slow day of fishing bearable!

[pushbutton]

Hhmnnn....kind of like playing "deadliest catch" without the cold and deadly part....yeah, got to try that sometime. When or is there even a best time of day/year to trap them? What to you look for as far as a spot? Whats type of set up do you use...boat or could a 320er come up and do it from shore?

[outdoors247]

WOW! That looks awesome. Great job Pikestabber.

[pikestabber]

Hhmnnn....kind of like playing "deadliest catch" without the cold and deadly part....yeah, got to try that sometime. When or is there even a best time of day/year to trap them? What to you look for as far as a spot? Whats type of set up do you use...boat or could a 320er come up and do it from shore?

From my experience, the best time of year is Jul-Sep. We have got them later, but I think they spread out more to different depths then (at least where I trap) and become less predictable. They spawn in June, so if you get them during the spawn the tails of the females are packed with eggs and it makes for an unappealing meal to have eggs floating all over the pot! I imagine you could get them pre-spawn, too, but we are on the walleye hunt for most of May-June, so I make July 1 my start date and trap through Labor Day (we have a big boil on the 4th and again on Labor Day). At the risk of hi-jacking my own thread, here's a run-down of what I have learned, and perhaps others can chime in with their thoughts:

As far as traps go, some definitely work better than others. Traps that are darkened either by spray paint, spray rubber, etc., (or traps made with vinyl coated mesh versus galvanized) always outdo the regular galvanized hardware cloth traps that are left unpainted. I think a darker trap offers a bit more security and the crayfish find the trap openings easier, enter more freely, and are less apt to find a quick exit. I have started making box traps versus cylinder traps as they sit more securely on the bottom (in lakes) with less weight required, stack easier, transport easier, etc. I make mine about 10” wide by 10” tall by 24” long. If you want to experiment, buy a minnow trap and expand the opening to 2.5” or so. I would buy the ones with holes on both ends versus just one, and the cylinder ones are fine for getting started if you can’t find square traps. I run about 10 traps at a time, but you could certainly run 3-4 in a good location and get enough for a meal.

In terms of numbers, if your traps aren’t pretty full within 2-3 hours, I suggest you move to a different location. Crayfish are way more active overnight, but if you want to set for a day and pull that same day without having to stay the night or come back early the next morning, you can definitely find spots that will allow this to happen. If the conditions are right, a box trap of the dimensions I gave should have several dozen crayfish in it within a few hours if you’re in the right area (it may sound like a load of ____, but we’ve pulled well over a 1,000 crayfish in an afternoon set before with just 10 traps).

I imagine it’s possible to trap successfully from shore, but I would plan on having waders on or at least getting wet up to your waist. We’ve have caught crayfish in as shallow as 1’ and as deep as 16’, and I imagine they go much deeper still. The main thing is having a lake with a big population. If there aren’t rustys in it, I won’t bother. 5’-8’ on the edge of a primary weed line is my favorite area most of the year. Rocks are great, but not necessary. My best spot doesn’t have a rock near it for a ½ mile, but it has a great big weed bed for them to feed, hide, etc. Crawfish are omnivores, so plants are important to their diet, too, and in lieu of a pick rock pile, don’t shun a big bed of greens, either. That said, rocks=crayfish pretty much always, so if you can get a lake map and locate some rock piles, that’s as good a bet as any to start.

For my two cents, I think fresh fish is the best bait, but it must be rough fish to be legal. I’ll usually go smack a few redhorse before I trap and put a half fish in each trap (be sure to hang the fish from the center of the trap…if you just toss it in, it often slides to one side or the other and they eat at it from outside the trap). I have heard that chicken or turkey gizzards and other poultry parts work well, too. In any case, I think the fresher the bait, the better the results. I used to have some crayfish in an aquarium. A freshly killed minnow got devoured. A day old dead minnow went untouched.

I hope that gets you started. I have hung up the traps for the year, but I still think there’s plenty of good days left this late summer/fall. Last weekend 8’ plus did better for us than 6’ and less.

[pushbutton]

Awesome info! Thanks....Talked to a DNR invasives dude and looks like the closest lake to me is Mille Lacs ...... and it is loaded with them. Not to take this even further off topic, but might also be a reason for the explosion of smallies on the lake. Yeah, do not know if I will be able to chase them this year, but for sure headed there with traps in tow next year. Thanks again, and back to the regularly scheduled programming of that Zaa looks sweeeet......

[delcecchi]

They are slowly coming my way on Vermilion. At least one good thing will come out of it since I can't do anything to stop them.

[LindellProStaf]

I love crayfish trapping too. Just started last summer and just do it off the dock. I thought all of mine were Rustys too. I talked to a DNR guy I know and he asked if the tips of the pinchers were jet black. He said regular crayfish look exactly like Rustys except the Rustys have that jet black tip on the pinchers. SO the ones I caught were just regular crawdads. I just like saying crawdads.... Saw a youtube video and this hot chick was cooking them and she called the mudbugs.....

[BTL]

That pizza looks outstanding, Great info on trapping too. Thanks for posting!

[pikestabber]

The primary way to tell them apart are the three distinct marks they have:

Honestly, though, the size is a dead giveaway as they are much bigger than native crayfish, and I really don't think they resemble natives in color, etc., either. That said, they all taste great!

[pikestabber]

That pizza looks outstanding, Great info on trapping too. Thanks for posting!

Thanks, BTL. Hopefully more and more folks get into trapping/eating these tasty invasives. Now if I could only come up with a good recipe for Zebra Mussels...

[LindellProStaf]

Hey thanks pikestabber. Good info..