I am in minnesota and I am bored. I am going to start hunting invasive species because, as far as I know, there are no seasons or limits. picrel is a rusty crayfish. I cant wait to catch and eat them
invasive species
I am in minnesota and I am bored. I am going to start hunting invasive species because, as far as I know, there are no seasons or limits. picrel is a rusty crayfish. I cant wait to catch and eat them
In my area the government is weird about eating invasives. Specifically the invasive shellfish like European green crabs and Japanese clams. The official rules say to leave where they're found and report them. No idea why
Only thing I can figure is maybe they're concerned about people misidentifying them. Like with the OP, maybe somebody would kill a native species of crayfish after mistakenly thinking it's an invasive species
The middle of winter is a hell of a time to get crawdads in Minnesota.
You probably won’t catch any. In Louisiana, they burrow into the mud in winter and emerge during the spring, aka crawfish season.
The best way to catch them recreationally is with square crawfish nets. You bait them with trash food (cow spleen/melt, turkey necks, whatever’s cheap), and lay them maybe 20ft apart. If you’re laying them from the shore or side of a road it helps to have a 10’ length of 3/4 pvc to place and retrieve the nets, as ideal spots are rarely easily accessible.
Before cooking, most conditions require crawfish to be purged. Since they live in mud, their digestive tracks will be pretty nasty, and all of the contents will be emptied into your boil. There are two ways to purge; let them soak in clean water for a long time (which I’ve never done), or dose them in a lot of salt right before cooking (which I and everyone else does). You use a full 26oz canister of salt of salt per sack of crawfish (a sack is 30-35lbs). I know the crawfish they catch in the PNW don’t need as much purging, as they live in more Sandy conditions. It really is a matter of environment.
If you boil them in plain water and season them afterward you should just have a nice day right now. Get online and buy some Zatarain’s seafood boil or other equivalent.
>If you boil them in plain water and season them afterward you should just have a nice day right now
Blue board, dipshit. Copy a different meme.
Boiling crawfish in a seasoned boil is how it’s done in southeast Louisiana. If you do it a different way, you’re doing it wrong.
He's right.
t. Fellow Cajun
>muh board color appropriate meme
good god you sound like a homosexual
i dont give a frick about how people in your shit state do stuff
>I hate rural states
Ok, enjoy your bug hive
>I don’t care how they cook a specific food in a states that’s known for it
It’s like saying you don’t care how they barbecue in Memphis or something. You’ve probably never even eaten crawfish, much less caught and boiled them.
>I don't care how Maine cooks lobster!
>I don't care how Texas cooks brisket!
>I don't care how Phillly does cheesesteaks!
>I don't care how SoCal does Mexican!
Confirmed moron.
>Blue board, dipshit. Copy a different meme.
>Boiling crawfish in a seasoned boil is how it’s done in southeast Louisiana. If you do it a different way, you’re doing it wrong.
You are a great example why to never eat Cajun or seafood outside Louisiana. It's like the rest of the States can't handle eating anything more flavorful than a glue stick.
>muh spicy food
Damn, way to prove him right. Cajun food isn’t just spicy. I’m n fact most of it isn’t spicy at all. If you have spicy étouffée then the chef fricked up.
I've started to skip purging and haven't noticed any real drop in quality. I do rinse very very thoroughly though. Like, until the water I'm rinsing with runs off them clear, which may actually be accomplishing the same thing actually.
Fricking Yankees stick to crab.
Yeah, I’ve heard of people skipping a salt purge and just rinsing thoroughly, but they all said to do it over night. I also saw a video that said straight tails don’t mean anything. The dude took several dead crawfish, boiled them, and they still curled up.
Louisiana harvests 26% of the blue crabs/Chesapeake crabs eaten in the US, more than any other state. Half of those come from Lake Pontchartrain, where I go to get them for free.
They’re boiled in heavy seasoning because we know better.
I def rinse over the course of several hours. Not overnight but the better part of a day. Didn't realize there was so much crab harvest in here in the Pontchartrain. Very informative anon
We got Northern Pike in Arizona. Rules are you either immediately kill them or immediately release them. You can be ticketed for having a live one on a stringer.
We also have Sailfin Mollies surviving in the Lower Salt River, but you can't harvest them, kill them, or use them as bait. The males are bright blue, females are plan grey. Bass and trout are absolutely gorging on them in the summer.
Eurasian Collared-Dove are All year, No Limit. Problem is on the fly, they look just like Mourning and White-Wing Dove which have seasons.
I'm a birder and those dove species look different in flight. But I do know that hunters suck shit at IDing anything in flight. Not sure why though.
>We got Northern Pike in Arizona.
What fish do the pikes out compete? Where did they come from?
Part of me hopes we get carp in the great lakes, I want to catch some of those big bastards
>Part of me hopes we get carp in the great lakes, I want to catch some of those big bastards
Be the change you want to see. Invasive species mostly depend on their natural capabilities and human stupidity to spread, but if they are spread on purpose by a determined individual it's crazy what can happen.
Look up Stewart Smith and what he did to New Zealand if you want to see what I mean.
Do it in your own pond. There's no reason to shit up natural habitats just to catch some shitty mud fish.
>some shitty mud fish
I'm more of a snakehead guy
I'm looking forward to them spreading around further. If only the states would stop squawking about "muh bass displacement" and actually regulate them like the mini-sturgeons they are.
The Pike are only in a few lakes in the mountains, and they typically out-compete the Bass and Trout there.
my understanding is some people decided they wanted them in Arizona, so they smuggled some into AZ and dumped them in the mountains. They luckily have stayed locked to about 3 or 4 bodies of water. Everywhere else is too warm for them here.
>and they typically out-compete the Bass and Trout there
Yeah, like those aren't invasive themselves LOL
You don't want carp bro. They eat shit loads of native larva/fry, they make everything muddy by churning up the water when they feed, they small bad, and there is very little good meat on them.
No lie, they're fun as hell to catch on light tackle (26.7lb on 2lb test is my PB), but honestly I'd rather see them gone at the end of the day.
He's probably talking about asian carp. European carp (the bottom feeders) have been in the Great Lakes for centuries now.
The Asian carps are actually filter feeders that swim in the water column eating plankton and algae.
>Part of me hopes we get carp in the great lakes
No you don't. They taste like shit and destroy any body of water they touch
catching crayfish can sometimes fall under baitfish rules, so I'd just check with that, but in Ontario the rules are very lax, 36 crayfish/day
36 crawfish a day? That's nothing! I mean at a boil someone's easily eating 3-5lbs of crawfish.