Ep. 905: The Life of a Crabber

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We hunt the meat-eater podcast. You can't predict anything. Brought to you by First Light. When I'm hunting, I need gear that won't quit. First Light builds no-compromise gear that keeps me in the field longer. No shortcuts. Just gear that works. Check it out at firstlight.com. That's F-I-R-S-T-L-I-T-E dot 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 crabbing. We're here for the Fish Eater Classic Fishing Tournament. You've been spending a couple days in a boat with Dirt Myth. 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 filming 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. Yeah, I find that every situation is better with Dirt around. I agree, man. So you approve of the cameraman. I agree. I do. 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 in Chesapeake Bay, like in the blue crab world, that tends to be a thing that people kind of inherit. Yeah. You know, people come. People come up in it. And their kids come up in it. Is that true? Like, it's a 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, yeah. 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. And he did it because his dad did it. Yeah. And he did it because there was no other option. You know what I mean? I got it. I got it. But you didn't inherit it. No. No, no. So walk me through that. Like, because, I mean, because you're a professional crabber. 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, like, not that there's a lot of similarities between crab and riding, but. And riding, 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, yeah. I don't need a side job anymore. Right. I mean, was it, was it, was it, was it, when you're crabbing, 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, 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 to be able to go crabbing again in the spring. Okay. 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, I started helping on a crab boat when I was like 12. Okay. This 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 that. Okay. So, you know, it wasn't much, it was cash, but it wasn't much. Yeah. Like, so, so you, were you surrounded by where you grew up? Were you surrounded by crabbers? No, there's not many crabbers around at all. Like the area that I'm from in particular, Pasadena is like, there's a few, but it's not, it's not common whatsoever. I think like we did a head count of the fleet, I think like guys are out there making their living. 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 of Maryland. Okay. On the Eastern shore, there's a lot more crabbers. 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 crabbers 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 doing them all. Yeah, I've done that with guys. Yeah. You know, where you, I don't know, a hundred chicken necks on a string, you know. Yeah. Yeah, I got it. And there ain't nothing wrong with that. You know, that's a great way to go. And 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, 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 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 science 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 listening, like, it's this big, long line. Yeah. 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. Yeah, yeah. 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 of doing it. Or now, like a lot of guys like to run snoods 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 a 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? They call it a snood, yeah. That's what comes off a turkey's head. Yeah, yeah, I guess so. Yeah. You're 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 that go catch them. So they're just like, you know, they're in it for the, they'll hold on to that. that thing all the way up, man. And you raise the line up and 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 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 I mean? Are there dudes that do that by themselves? I would say most guys that do it that way do it by themselves. Driving the boat. 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 we built for like some of my helpers and everything. They've been wanting to go. But like we even have it with the console is just an 8x8 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, steer with your left hand, and then dip with your right hand, and then you got the call box in front of you. So you can run it as a one-man band pretty easy. Yeah, yeah. But you'll see some goofy boats, but it's like there's always a reason. They're set up kind of weird. It looks strange. You're facing forward, you know, steering like this, but it allows you to do it by yourself. But then, but you're. So the main deal is running crab traps. Yeah, so I'm potting. I'm crab potting. Okay. 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. What's. What's the term? We call it a hawk. Where'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. Yeah. 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 leader, basically, with like a metal clip. Okay. And then every 75 foot. And then every 75 foot on the main line, there's like an overhand loop tied in the main line. Yeah. And so each clip gets clipped on to the loop. Yeah. 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. Yeah. And then stack all the loops on the PVC pipe in order. Got it. You know. Yeah. 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 pots. Yeah. That's a strange deal there, man. Yeah. Yeah. It's like 90% of crabbing, though. Yeah. 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. And 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. You can go out there and catch crabs. You can go out there and make a living catching crabs. Yeah. And the devil's in the detail, right? Yeah. So, we clean every pot every time it comes over the rail. And we don't let them sit more than like four days. Okay. 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. Yeah. 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. We'll catch on their little huts and start to grow. Yeah. 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 longevity of the pot or the performance of the pot? I'm trying to do it because the 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. Why is 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 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 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 new 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 of crabs as like they're these dirty scavengers. They're just, you know, they'll eat whatever. And they will. 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 an 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. You could look at it like you're trapping crabs or you're cleaning gear. You look at it like you're cleaning. I look at it. 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're like. Yeah. And you agitate it 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 times probably 7 to 12 seconds on a pot, you know. How hot's the water? 145 degrees. So, it's not like super hot. So, the air's already real hot and then you're hovering over that damn thing. Yeah, it sucks. Yeah. Yeah, it's, 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 is right behind me. There's a diesel burner heating it like right next to that. That's what heats that tank. Yeah, I built it out of like a heat pump from a house, like a Beckett heat pump. Basically runs it through like a coil. What I'm saying, like I know what that means, but I don't know what a Beckett heat pump is. It's what heats your house if you have. If you have like an oil furnace. Yeah, I got you. Yeah, same kind of deal. Got it. But my run's off golf cart batteries. Oh, really? Yeah. So, yeah, I mean, it can be definitely be pretty brutal. Like the other second day of fishing and 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 does suck, but I was like. This isn't phasing you. 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. Yeah. On the crab boat. How many? How many? Those, how many? Well, how big is your, 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 are you going to check? 575. Okay. And then. So 23 rows. What's a, I'm sure it's seasonal, but just give me like, like they're working right now. Right. Your crew's out there right now. Yeah. Okay. So, so right now, um, July. Um, 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. Um, 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 size crabs, good grade, that's a good pot. So you do that 575 times, you know, you're looking all right. Yeah. Uh, 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. Um, 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. Um, to check the grade on them, you know, 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, uh, 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. Yeah. It's just water inside there. Why is that? Uh, it's cause they shit when they shit. you know so they'll go to slough 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 up. - Yeah, to be able to defend themselves. So they're absorbing 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, 'cause they're hanging out in oyster beds and things like that, picking at the shells, 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's going to-- - Then they'll start eating and packing on actual meat. - Right, but you'll notice 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 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, their shells will get-- - Oh, that's when they mate? That's the one time they mate? - That's the one time they mate. So when they're an immature female, we call them a sally. Right, and so it'll be a little crab, like maybe that big, and they have a pyramid-shaped apron. And you can tell that that immature female's going to shed into a mature female, 'cause their apron will get like a purple-pink hue. - Okay. - So that's when the, that's basically when the crab, 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 are fighting with each other. - That crab grabs onto that girl crab and totes her around. - Couple weeks. - Fighting off other guys. - Mm-hmm, yep. - And she just, she kind of goes along with it? - Yeah, she's happy to be involved, I think, you know? - Dude, really? Look at this, man. Really? - Yep, yep. - Is that common just across crab-ness? 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, yep, 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 sallie's giving off something that, you know, indicates that she's in heat, right? - Oh, sure, man. - So, like, we look at-- - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - 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, you know. Once they're red, we say they're rank. So, which means they're gonna shed in the next day or two. - Okay. - That's how we tell a peeler on the boat, which we'll shed in a saw crab, but-- - Hold on a minute, hold on a minute. Is a peeler good or bad for you? - A peeler's good for me, 'cause I-- - So, you're allowed to keep, you're allowed to keep a female-- - Yeah. - Crab 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, it goes to three and a quarter inches, I believe, or three and a half inches across the top. - I don't mean to keep bringing-- - For the sally, you know, I mean, for a peeler. - Yeah. - Normal blue crab starts at five inches, goes to five and a quarter, for keepers. - I gotta have you say that again. - For a male. - Yeah, okay. So, that crab's coming up. - Mm-hmm. - Getting bigger, bigger, bigger. - Mm-hmm. - And then she gets to where she's gonna molt or shed, and then she's gonna get, the guy's gonna carry her around, breed her, and then she's gonna turn into, like, then she's gonna breed, produce eggs. - Yeah. - And then she's gonna live for how long after that? - I don't really know. - But she just is hanging out and is never gonna have babies again. - No, no, no, no, so she'll carry, you know, she'll carry it 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 some version. - Basically, yeah, yeah, yeah. So, they only, they do the deed one time. - That's what was blowing my mind, okay. - Yeah, it's a common misconception that they'll only sponge one time. - She gets fertilized one time. - Yeah, and then she's set for the rest of her life. - That juices her for 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's the old crab? - I mean, I don't really know for sure, but I think they say an old crab's 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. If she's that big as a mature female, she'll stay that big. If she's that big, she'll stay that big. - Is that right? - Yep, yep, 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, or 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. - Oh, 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 'em 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 gonna, 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? - Yeah. - 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? 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Make sure you sign up for their email and text message notifications so you get the alert the exact second the knife drops. Montana Knife Company, working knives for working people. Head to mkc.com today. That's mkc.com. I can't wait to check out one of these folders. - So what's the most valuable one you can catch? And I got another question for you. What the hell is this? I know what a soft shell is. He just explained it. - Right. That's good for you or bad for you. That's gotta be good for you, right? - Yeah, so soft shells are good. 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 um 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 salt as like a perfect soft crab because they i got they're not 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 uh 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 hours oh yeah oh yeah dude like when we get these peeler 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 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 at 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 place and they're all in the same place and they're somehow kind of all in the same cycle and a lot in a lot of ways it's kind of weird like i don't even know what it's like calving season man for like yeah every two hours are you serious yeah man how many of those how many of those things unless let's just i don't want to ask you a question like like how much is in your bank account but how many of those things you can how many putting 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 um 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 still got a couple days until it sheds but especially the immature females are 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 you know number kill them they just kill them i don't they don't they don't eat them they just kill them man they don't really eat when they're going to shed like we never people 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 if you when you go in and get a when you go into when you're out in that neck of the woods and you go into and you see in a restaurant soft shell crab there's a better chance that some dude hatched that thing in a monitored that thing in a tank yeah 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 fit either fish bait or be cleaned and frozen you know sold as a frozen soft grab got it because you know you pull up a pot and you got one soft 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 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 has the surface and it's game on all them crabs are just locked on to each other and they're you know oh yeah i know what you're talking about so 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 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 this is a lot of this is new to me walk through the different crabs you har 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 yeah dumping them out on the table and everybody's picking crabs and eating them 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 that's the highest grade crab it's like uh you know the xls and the jumbos 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 expense and that's an expensive it's high dollar but you know we don't we're not catching much of those so like for instance we might catch you know like the other day we had 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 flat crab come with them up in the pot and then we have our number ones um i'll keep back up one sec yeah what's that big ass crab worth i sell them at my place live 100 bucks a dozen okay 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 i'll get 150 bucks a dozen but we might get two dozen a day people are buying those to throw down like on a nice yeah party dinner kind of thing like that at 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 dozen crabs man like 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 bit of a hurry and they're just like in a bit of a hurry and they're just like in a bit of a hurry and they're just like in a bit of a hurry and they're just like in a bit of a hurry and they're just like in a bit of a hurry and they're just like in a bit of a hurry and they're just like in a bit of a hurry and they're just like in a bit of a hurry and they're just like in a bit of a hurry and they're just like in a bit of a hurry to do that and there's other people that like it's almost like maryland it's almost like bragging rights people like i paid 150 but 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 so it's expensive but they sell yeah i mean like you can't go into a restaurant and get crabs that are that great even if you're paying more like those are the crabs we call them the the uh the noah guy crabs you know because like really you got to know a guy to get crabs like that you know what i mean okay yeah um so then we have a lot more 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 uh we call them at five and three quarters to six and three quarters but that's your like market size crab uh that's what i'm shooting for is to get the most amount of those that's the bread and butter 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 they're that's the a large you know and you're gonna see at a crab feast or something if it's just your bunnies you know yeah um and then the next tier would be numbers and those are going for how much it doesn't i think right now i'm at seventy dollars a dozen on them and like 400 bucks a bushel which is six dozen crabs 400 bucks a bushel yeah cost a lot to catch them well no i'm not 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 uh sick of deer hunting i think i see we had like a bushel yeah it was cool yeah yeah yeah it was no joke i mean but pull up a bushel yeah so that's 400 bucks for the crabs yeah in today's prices yeah for yeah for me i mean a lot of places are a lot more and some places are cheaper yeah got it um i never claimed to have the cheapest crabs and those go to and are you you have restaurant clients no it's not anymore i i used to it's all 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 i you know i they can do whatever they want with them you know they buy them but they're priced out of being middleman and that's almost a little bit of that's on purpose you know what i mean yeah i got so it's at a price point you're not going to have somebody if somebody were to be buying those crabs for a restaurant um there would be no margin although i do have cases differently yeah 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 crab guy you know what i mean on youtube or whatever so just yeah so the way like just the you've developed a certain market you serve a certain clientele or you're just out of the restaurant business and you're selling two people food to their friends and families yeah yeah yep yep and you know i used to sell to restaurants and things like that but um 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 um yeah because yeah your you're always going to assume that you're going to be skimming the better grade off the top yeah that's really the big thing you know what i mean um 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 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 a 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 i 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 uh you know a ticket i picked up a check on monday you know and like we weren't we're just throwing crabs into baskets 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 gotta you know like every crab goes in the basket upright i mean we've always tried to do that 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 and 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 xls you got the bread and butter crab number one my favorite crab okay and then we got number twos which are going to be your smaller crab um this doesn't matter like these are at this point these are all males yes all males okay um 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 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 um but you know for the most part i mean i've seen enough crabs i can pretty much just call them by eye um so we got number twos those are going to be our smaller crabs but so remember number twos number ones and xls 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 okay 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 i got confused we need a chart it's because it's a it's a size issue or is it something different it's something different so it's when you squeeze a big crab can be a trash crab yeah that's when we squeeze them right and so they've we can and we can tell that they've shed but they haven't you know they're still alive and they're alive and they're alive and they're alive they haven't yet filled their new shell out yeah but so even if he was if he's eight inches he's going in the light basket if if he's five and a quarter he's going in the same basket i got you that's what they're all the same value it's just a per pound or whatever dollar a crab baby oh that's how that goes 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 i you know 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 okay you're great for kids and things like that um 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 let him be a ten dollar yeah exactly a ten dollar crab instead of a dollar crab but if i came to you begging for a basket of lights you'd oblige me yeah yeah i mean we they don't live real good in a walk-in either so we'll usually keep like two bushel on a friday just because i have some regulars that like they they prefer those crabs so knowing you're going to sell over the weekend on a friday you'd keep some yeah i'd keep a couple but i ain't you know i'm not keeping i ain't gonna keep 10 bushel of them on a monday you're just gonna 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 dollars for a bushel of crabs i mean got it it seemed to me it's a little counterintuitive when you try to you know catch them somehow if you let two of them if you let that whole bushel go yeah 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 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 um and there's no size limit across the carapace you know no point-to-point limit size on a female female crab it's just if it's a mature female crab you can take it so not everybody but i have a license over borders the mesh on the pot such that it's already it's already sorting 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 um 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 um but yes so in the pots i have different mesh size wire yeah uh and that does a lot of the calling for us yeah and then we also have call rings which are plastic rings in the sides of the pot i've seen those yeah and so i have different size call rings um that i open up at different times of the year i got you know what i mean when because like right now there we had that male shed 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 and so i have you know 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 just it's going to slow everybody down you're getting bit up so you use the right ring so i put bigger rings in there so i'll you know i can let a legal crab out but i'm not 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 like 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 you know big crabs trap big crabs little trap little crabs trap little crabs and females kill everything they'll they don't trap any males yeah mature females they usually run together in a pack so you'll pull poscott 30 of them which is killing males no male goes in there he's dead dude they're they're gonna tear him up god man you'd like to ask them why they're doing it yeah competition competition competition competition competition or something i don't know man they're just vicious they're they're uh unassuming yeah you know what i mean i think they they lure them in there and then kill them really they got some kind of vendetta i guess or something i don't know wow daddy issues i guess so these dudes like the dudes that work for you do you have the same guys all the time or is it just like are they like freelance camera guys you just go grab one or grab one in a lot of ways they're like freelance camera guys yeah a lot of times they're like freelance camera guys but um 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 um 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 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 then 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 yeah 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 on the boat every time i'm on the boat i try to make every job on the boat every time i'm on the boat every step um something that basically a monkey could do if need be you know what i mean it's great skilled guys and all the guys learn the different roles and see 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 three high pushing them to the back of the boat it's kind of the low man on the totem pole job um and then i would say depending on the boat in the area it's going to be a lot of different things 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 um 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 because they're in charge of their grade right yeah like then yeah that's what i don't know based on based on me knowing nothing i would think that that would be like the right the that'd be the important job yeah it is you know and when i sold the market it was a more important it was to me it was more important to have a more skilled guy on there um because you weren't giving them a second look right but now you know i have a i can afford a little bit of buffer in that area because you know we're the 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 mass crew or, you know, something like that, I know, well, maybe I could pull, you know, if we got to 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 at 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 a hundred, 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 that maybe don't already have a job. 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. It doesn't require bringing your own equipment except yourself. So, you know. Learn more at AmericanMilitaryUniversity.com. I'm holding in my hot little hand here the first ever folding knife from Montana Knife Company. Dude, this thing is sweet. They like reimagined folding knives. You touch this thing and you know you are holding a quality product. Montana Knife Company, founded by Josh Smith, one of the most experienced master bladesmiths in the world. 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You ever get that feeling? You're stuck inside staring at screens and a primal urge kicks in. You crave wide open spaces, fresh air, the chance to connect with the land. Well, maybe it's time to find your own piece of the wild, but searching for property can be a maze. That's where land.com comes in. They got millions of listings across the country from mountain ranches to hidden fishing holes. Their search tools are like a seasoned guide, helping you narrow down what you want. Land.com isn't just about buying and selling. It's about finding a place to hunt, fish, explore, or simply sit by a campfire and listen to the crickets. So head over to land.com today to turn one day into today, because trust me, there's nothing quite like the feeling of standing on your own piece of earth. Because you, because you allow so much visibility through, through video and other stuff, you allow so much visibility into your, how you get your product and sell your product. Yeah. Do crew guys come to you? Like, cause they want a job. Yeah. Yeah, they do. And it's kind of funny. Cause 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, they're going to want to try to sue you or something, you know, you get guarded. Yeah. I'm very guarded. And 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, I, I do a fair amount of vetting, you know, just cause you know, that, or it's some kid that just wants to put it all over a Snapchat story that he's not going to be any good anyway. So I try to find, seek out crew members that are like, not interested in what I, you know, not, not interested in the, in the, in video and whatever else. Yeah. Yeah. They're not trying to be like a crab. Exactly. They're there for the income, not the outcome. Yeah. Well, let's talk about the infrastructure a minute. So you said you got, you got a trot line boat that you keep for crew guys to use or whatever. Yeah. You got your main, you got, 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, sitting in my front yard, that's what I'm saying. Like, it's gotta 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 ways. 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 gotta 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 2000 bucks a year to hold it to the state. So we've got like 30 grand 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, 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 quarter million bucks. Okay. Crab pots, $52 a piece finished out. So I got 1500 of those. I have another commercial license, a 300 pot license that I hold. So that one's probably worth 10,000 bucks, 15,000 bucks. Did you fish that one or you just hold it? No, we, we, we'll run them both on the boat sometimes when there's limits. Okay. Cause you can keep two limits with two license. I got you. You know, we got, a retail location that I own, you know, piece of commercial property that I own with a little stand on it. Uh, we got refrigerator trailers, we got trucks, you know, boats. There's a lot of, 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, you know, because the thing is with crab and it's like the margins ain't there to, to go and, you know, buy all the stuff and just go, you'd like, it would take you forever to make money back. So you get something, you make a little money, use it to buy parts, kind of assemble it 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's not like you went out one day and just started laying down cash. No, no. I mean, that would never make any sense. Yeah, exactly. So it's like, and see, and that's another reason it's generational. A lot of times it's because these guys, you know, the son gets into it and he doesn't have to go buy a hundred thousand dollars. And he doesn't have to buy a license, you know, or if he does, you know, they have a lot of that backend infrastructure. They have markets already in line, you know, some guys, there is 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 like, 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. It's like cattle ranching in the West where you have this like diminishing number of 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 crabbing 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 the thing in crabbing? Oh, man. And I always say, I'm like, you're lucky to retire from crabbing. Then they like buy a ranch. Yeah. 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, that's not a relaxing occupation. Yeah, but there's a misconception. People, people like romanticize, you know. Don't 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 crabbing. 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 engines going out. Yeah. And I'm like, meanwhile, I'm like half those people you've seen there, they're freaking high. You know what they're going out to get their butt kicked. - Seriously, I had no idea people would think that that'd be like a 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 are like guys like that do they last no I 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 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 gonna buy his rig I promise you know we're like making bets we're like two years that boat could be mine you know what I mean I'm gonna hit I'm gonna I'm gonna go get his number because he's gonna need to unload that license in three years I'll be getting all that exactly a hundred percent because they're gonna be like this is a hot disaster my luck you know I'm the best way to you know become a millionaire crab and start with two million you know what I mean start with two million bucks you could be a one millionaire crabber you know what I mean uh yeah it's kind of 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 gonna retire and get into crabbing 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 gonna let anybody push me around I'm gonna be the guy and it's like yeah all right buddy good luck you gotta just like you gotta just be the kind of person that can just work though dude yeah you gotta I'm telling you man you gotta 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 crabbing you know what I mean like you you'll go crazy like and I am a little crazy like you just you gotta we joke but like you gotta be a little nutty to you know yeah just go do that but how long do you think you'll do it I 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. yeah 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 then you're just like the kind of dude sitting back like with the calculator not really I like doing it I like it do you want to just keep I love doing it yeah I love doing it okay I uh yeah I love 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 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 or you know I have health issues or something I'm married oh you're married okay yeah got it um but no kids not yet no um 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're they are literally dying out there they're in their 60s and 70s yeah because they've never said anything up on the back end and or they just really want to do it you know but a lot of them like they 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're 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 I don't you know I don't want to run my body into oblivion just to have to pay my mortgage where'd you first run into your wife uh my wife is actually from Lancaster Pennsylvania and I met her because my mom and stepdad had 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 till 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 she think of the whole crab and things you like it she likes it yeah she go out on the boat with you and stuff occasionally um 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 crabber and she's like what the heck does that even mean and then we ended up getting married like 10 years later you know what I mean it wasn't her what yeah yeah yeah no dude it was a 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 understand it with an understanding that you're married to it you know what I mean like you marry me you marry the life yeah you're pretty clear about what you're gonna do yeah yeah and she's always known me as that and so you know she's she's always been very supportive of it which is great that's important I think because um style man I mean like I said this here this week is the first time I've ever been away in the middle of summer no that's what we're literally me and some of the guys were laughing about they were talking about you were on uh FaceTime or something with your crew trying to sort through some issues and stuff in the middle of like the fishing tournament because they're not working 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 30 a.m yeah 4 30. uh 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 it sunrises 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 huh because if not then guys would just go out there and fish as many boxes they you know they go fish a thousand pots in a day if they could go all day and night oh huh 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 we'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 I mean or is it like there's always been crabs there will always be 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 so 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 is all factor into like what you're saying and yes I have concern with that um you know a lot of the laws and things like that um and the fluctuating crab populations uh and outside market too you know that's why I've gone 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 uh price of 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 um and then our crab meat Market you know the pick meat is overseas you know a lot of that is is a different species of crab that's just like our crab that's been shipped over from overseas home it shipped to you not to me I mean I don't sell no no not you but you mean like you're in Maryland you think you're in like blue crab country you're probably eating a Venezuelan blue swimmer crab what if you eat if you buy 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 dollars 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 they're 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 you know you know I wanted the retail spot to be able to kind of control my own Market a little bit no um you know my theory is like I said you can only kill crab one time you may as well get it well it's worth the most and um you 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 yeah and so for me it's not only selling the crab but also you know 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 so 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 uh you know obviously we're shooting video and things like that. that yeah but i've kind of it really truly kills me um but i've had to dial my opera crab operation to scale it back a little bit you know instead of running 1500 pots we're running less than a thousand 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 um there's only one of me you know and i got a lot of hands a lot of things right now that i'm trying to figure out how to do and build um i've kind of uh leaned more into the marketing side of the crabs you know what i mean selling less crabs um 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 that a lot of transparency as to where your product comes from what goes into it and what's coming out of it and what's coming out of it and what's coming out of it 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 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 gonna deceive people to try to make a couple extra bucks you know what i mean like kind of the shtick 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 yeah so 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 here's how i produce my product you can come out you you come to my ranch 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 tr 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 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 right and i like the things you think about right and right and i like the way you treat everything and and i'll just pay a couple bucks more yeah and right now that's where i'm that's that's how i'm making it work you know i don't know if it's always going to be like that or where that side of my business is going to go but right now that's you know that's that's what we're doing man it's a lot more work man on the back end and you 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 selling 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'm gonna keep these little bastards alive all week i'm 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 um but it's funny because as you mentioned like you can come visit the cow so my retail spot the crab stand is um it's called bodkin 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 um 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 uh 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 we back the fridge trailer up to it because everybody's trying to get to the bottom of the boat and i'm trying to get to the bottom of the boat because everybody's trying to get to the bottom of the boat and i'm trying to get to the bottom of the boat and i'm trying to get to the bottom of the boat and i'm trying to get to the bottom of the boat and i'm trying to get to the bottom of the boat and i'm trying to because everybody that would come to the crab stand was like had a story about crabbers other granddad was a crabber 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 um so it's a little unique but it's it's uh 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 um 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 i mean it's the only one in 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 that you know for people to look at and check it out and 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 um different fish you're supposed to catch what's your i'll tell you what i think then you can tell me all right where 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 you're 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 it would be i want to give you a tip a competitor tip 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 it's 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 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 know that what i'm saying is true i would never in a million years have made yesterday yeah yeah yeah yeah yesterday i had nothing to do with these rules yeah yeah yesterday was tough man that was a million years that was a tough day i would never in a million years have made anything to do with muskies yeah yeah i'm i'm anti-musky yeah i thought about that but i was like you know i get it we're you know 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 wouldn't there wasn't much going on well the evening well yeah yeah i mean so today could it be anybody's game that i i think that today um 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 to like dial on one thing yeah i'm good at filling a boat was yesterday was like the most specialist of all specialist days yeah today is a generalist day yeah and um when it comes to hunting and fishing i'm a generalist same jack of all trades master and none okay that's what i'd like to hear yeah well you're a crab specialist with the but you're a generalist and yeah i have i have a doctorate in crabbing but you know a minor and everything else a minor in general general collecting of crustaceans you know 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 um good to hear about crab and good uh um at tonight at the awards ceremony hopefully i'll be the guy with the huge check yeah yeah we actually got a huge check did you actually you actually got a big check the actual big check nice that's cool who had to carry that on the plane this is rolled up oh nice there you go all right man thanks stay tuned if you want to find out what happened with the fish eater classic stay tuned it's 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 i'm going to go and see what's going on i'm going to go and see what's going on i'm going to go and see what's going on i'm going to go and see what's going on i'm going to go and see what's going on i'm going to go and see what's going on in 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 a fresh water 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 great resource great vision check it out crow Rock Lodge thanks guys life moves fast at American Military University they're ready to help you keep up AMU's flexible affordable online programs in cyber security IT space studies and more are designed for service members veterans and their families AMU provides the support you need to take the next step wherever life takes you American Military University made for what's next learn more at amu.apus.edu slash military we're all saving for something whether it's a trip a concert or upgrading 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