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Using Pillow Traps to Catch Crawfish
We’ve all skilled that feeling after we study that we’ve been doing one thing incorrect our entire life. I just lately had that feeling once I was humbled by a gentleman who is aware of lots about catching crawfish.
CJ Mayeux was born in Bunkie, LA. That’s the place he discovered to run crawfish traps as a industrial fisherman. Now Mayeux is retired however he nonetheless likes to go crawfishing. I joined Mayeux on a visit to the Honey Island Swamp to study extra about how he catches these “mudbugs.”
We began our day in Indian Village which is positioned on the West Pearl River positioned on the MS/LA border. After launching his 19-foot custom-made aluminum crawfish boat into the river, we headed to the swamp. The boat was loaded down with pillow traps. I really personal a few of these traps, however I informed Mayeux that I don’t like them as a result of I by no means catch loads of crawfish with them. His reply to that assertion was “Nicely you’re both crawfishing within the incorrect place or setting the entice incorrect.” I shrugged it off and we entered the swamp. That’s the place Mayeux grabbed his first entice and began baiting it. He opened the primary entice and tossed in some minimize pogey (Menhaden). Then he secured it with a easy clothespin. Subsequent, he tied the road to a cypress tree and positioned the entice within the water. However as a substitute of inserting the entice horizontally on the swamp backside, the entice was set at a 45-degree angle.
That’s once I discovered that I had been doing all of it incorrect all this time.“These traps aren’t made to put horizontal,” he stated. “For those who lay pillow traps flat, the crawfish aren’t capable of get in as a result of the openings are about 3 inches off of the underside. When the entice is positioned at a 45-degree angle, the ramps to the openings contact the underside and the crawfish are capable of climb up the ramp and enter the entice.” This might clarify why I had by no means had a lot luck utilizing these traps – the crawfish merely couldn’t get into the entice. Mayeux continued to set the remainder of the 30 traps in his boat. “I normally allow them to soak for a day or two – so about each different day I empty and rebait them,” he stated. March kicks off the crawfish season for Mayeux. The Cajun veteran stated he has been catching 6-9 sacks of crawfish, working 100 traps each different day.
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