Clinton CT Town Dock 6-9-12 - Seahorse catch!

[cedar999]

Hi folks,

Spent two hours of incoming tide with three kids from 6 to 9 yrs, 7 traps, and some mackerel. Got 35 green crabs (the kids were counting), one barely legal or barely not Jimmy who went back, and one sponge crab, who of course also went back. So a terrible day for crabbing, but the kids at least had a blast.

But the AMAZING thing was that at one point we had a rush of seaweed coming in from the harbor and fouling all our traps.  Don't know what the weed is, but it was long and fat and with scalloped (not as in cut, but as in wavy) edges, looked a lot like really long and fat brown lasagna pasta strips. One of the traps had a big ball of it, and when we were removing it we found, of all things, a Seahorse! A little thing, no more than an inch and a half. The kids went wild! I of course had never caught one before (who has?) and had only seen them in aquariums. We gingerly sent him on his way. What a thing to see! One of the children exclaimed that she thought Seahorses were "only in bedtime stories" and never thought they really existed. Those kids will remember that probably forever. I wasn't unmoved either...

So, some bad crabbing, but between seeing both the sponge and the Seahorse, an awesome day of marine biology education for the kiddies!

We'll try again soon...

-Paul

[Seanile]

Cool!  Don't suppose you got a photo?  Mebbe had a camera with close-up abilities?

[cedar999]

Cool!  Don't suppose you got a photo?  Mebbe had a camera with close-up abilities?

No, I'm far too slow to have thought of that in time.  When I saw the "horse" and started to believe my eyes my main thought was to get the little thing back into the water ASAP, but thinking back it really wouldn't have taken that long to just whip out my phone and get a shot. Rats...

[SHELLFISH]

Thanks for the report but sorry you didn't get any legal crabs!

I have only seen one Sea Horse in our area of CT.
That I caught in a Lobster pot in 120 feet of water off Norwalk CT about six years ago.
Mine was a big brute, about six inches and all black in color.

I didn't get a picture of it either and also released it immediately.

[Ctcrab84]

That's so awesome. The kids must of been so excited to see that.heck I would of been excited to witness that too.dont worry the crabs will be coming.keep at it.
What kind of bait where u using ?

[boysenberrygirl]

Nice report!

I have yet to see a sponge or a horse. Something to look forward to.

[cedar999]

Thanks guys! I'm a middle-aged man heading into old age fast so am a bit jaded, but it really was a thing to see, even for me - after a while I suppose we all learn that it's always the smallest things that provide the most joy. My boy has lots of toys, but spends more time playing in the dirt than with all of them combined. He knows what's up! But he's going to forget it before he finally remembers it again...

Shellfish, big sucker! Was he big enough to not slip through the trap, or did something else keep him in?

CTcrab84, we were using frozen mackerel.  I would have preferred to use junk chicken parts, but my local supermarket only had the nicer cuts this week, so we went with the mackerel.

Boysenberrygirl, that was the first sponge I'd ever seen. I expect I'll see a few more and that you will too, but I don't expect to ever see an encore from the sea horse.  

-Paul

[Ronster]

Awesome bit of luck!

[tattoo]

Thats great allot of good memories for the kids,