Crawfish

[loo10]

I'd really like to hook up with someone who catches

some of the big ol' crawfish that are in Table Rock.

Anybody willing to hook up and teach an ol' dawg

some new tricks?

I'd appreciate it alot.

By the way...

I know they aren't in season now.

But I want to be ready.

[Wayne SW/MO]

I keep threatening, but just don't seem to get around to it. My past experience has been that an oily fish is probably the most consistent bait. There is a White River basin Crawdad that is large, thats for sure, but the name escapes me at the minute..

[loo10]

Oh I'm definately going to do this.

I just need someone who's willing

to steer me in the right direction.

Oily fish would be best.

I wish I could use the heads of the trout I clean

but I've been told "no" cause it's a game fish.

I have another idea though.

A pot of crawfish and a couple a cold ones

is A+ in my book.

[moose50]

my dad told me he used to use chunks of bacon on a piece of twine to catch em. tie the bacon to the string let er set for a while and pull it up and they are still hangin on the bacon. never tried it myself but lemme know if you do and if ya get anything off of it. good luck

[Phil Lilley]

I used to go crawdad'in many years ago in a couple of coves on TR at night- took the kids and flashlights and caught a tons of big ones. We would throw out fish guts earlier in the day and would have lots of them swarming the piles that night. We'd either gig them or just pick them up by hand.

I know there's a few people who set traps for them off docks- State Park is a great place to set traps if you can get permission.

Is there a bad place to find them on TR? I don't think so. May be larger rocks close to the bank would be better than pea gravel.

The only problem with setting traps is that they get taken if found by fishermen or other trap setters. Don't know the law on it- you may have to put your name on the traps and not leave them out for more than 24 hours without checking them- like a trot line. I'll ask.

[rookie]

I know there was a MO Dept. of Conservation article within the last year on crawdads, it was suggested to use a can of dog food.

[Sam]

My grandpa had the method on crawdads, as a by-product of our catfishing, back in the 1950's.

He raised some backyard chickens, and when my folks and I came to visit, he'd cut a couple of heads off and we'd have a big chicken dinner on Sunday. He'd put the chicken heads and guts in a gunny sack along with a big rock and bury it in his garden.

A week or so later he'd dig the sack up and we'd go fishing. You can imagine what that thing smelled like. He had to tie it to the back bumper of his '49 Plymouth, we sure couldn't have stood to have it in the trunk.

We'd go to Beaver Creek, a ways upstream from Rome, Mo. He'd tie a rope onto the top of the rotten gunny sack and throw it in the current at the head of a "hole", where the current was coming into deep water. We'd go fish elsewhere on the creek for a couple of hours, then come back and cast catfish baits just downstream of the sack. We'd always catch a bunch of catfish - every one of them in that hole of water would be around that sack.

When we got done fishing, he'd pull the sack out with the rope and there'd be big crawdads hanging all over the outside of it. We took those home, too.

I have no idea if this is legal or not - but it works.

[mhall02]

I keep threatening, but just don't seem to get around to it. My past experience has been that an oily fish is probably the most consistent bait. There is a White River basin Crawdad that is large, thats for sure, but the name escapes me at the minute..

Orconectes longidigitus or the long pincered crayfish. They do get big 6" or so, maybe bigger, found in the White River drainage.

[loo10]

I know there was a MO Dept. of Conservation article within the last year on crawdads, it was suggested to use a can of dog food.

I saved the article. My Mom goes to church with that guy's sister.

I'll be buying some traps and giving it a shot come spring.

I've heard dog food isnt that great a bait...

but that's what they said to use in the article.

[Wayne SW/MO]

I've used cat food and I think its better, but we did better with Carp.