The Tampa Bay Times
The opening few days of the 2021 stone crab season are here. The season opened last Friday and it was what everyone wished for – plenty of stone crabs with big delicious claws to collect. On the first day, It was easy for most competent stone crab hunters to get their limit is an hour or less. And talk about big claws. Many of our divers found some of the biggest claws that you can get. The really big ones are labeled as “colossal”sized claws. Colossal sized claws are as big as a man’s open hand. The bridges and structures that stone crabs call home produced large concentrations of crab. It’s been a few days since the open day of October 15th, but there are still many stone crabs hiding out along their common haunts under bridge structures and and pilings. Curious sheepsheads would swim in behind the divers as they pulled out the stone crabs. Some of the very experienced spearfishermen/crab hunters keep a small, but lethal speargun by their side to take the occasional shot at the too curious sheepshead. If a diver gets really lucky that fish poking around by the hunter might be a legal sized gag grouper. Some of our divers manage to limit out on gags and stone crab claws on the same dive. If you are a diver and want to try your hand at stone crab hunting, learn how to find them and how to pull off a claw without killing the crab. Your local dive shop should be able to help.
- Jay Mastry - March 26, 2024
- Captains Corner, Gorta - March 23, 2024
- Dave Zalewski - March 12, 2024
