raining ktula

Shrimpin’ Ain’t Easy

June 25th, 2007 by ktula

15 cans of Friskies salmon-flavored cat food as shrimp bait: $7.39

1 Shell fishing license for the State of Washington: $10.95

2 rolls of 5/16 leaded 400-ft rope: $40

1 Garmin GPS 72 handheld GPS navigator for shrimping coordinates: $107.74

2 Ladner nestible shrimp pots: $131.90

1 4-hour 11.5′ Livingston motor boat rental from Hood Canal Kayak: $150

Driving more than 4 hours between Seattle and Union, boating up and down the Hood Canal for more than 4 hours, pulling up by hand (without a pot puller) more than 1800-ft of ropes with dangling shrimp pots weighing anywhere from 10 lbs to 20 lbs while catching only one f@#ing spot shrimp by the end of the day as well as soaking a Sony Ericsson K608i cell phone: Priceless

About 4 weekends ago, i had the misfortune of having to cook one of the best tasting shrimps ever: the spot shrimps. I bought more than 2 lbs of live spot shrimps from Mutual Fish and with shrimps that fresh, some Chinese rice wine and minced ginger were all i added prior to steaming them. About a week later, i came across an article in the Seattle Times about “Shrimpin’ on Hood Canal“. One of the first few things i did immediately after reading the article was to find out if shrimping was still allowed in the nearby area (according to the author of the article, the day that she went shrimping on Hood Canal was the last day of the shrimping season there). From the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife website, i found out that due to the shrimping limit not being reached, recreational shrimping in Marine Area 12 (aka Hood Canal) was going to be extended for another day: June 23rd.

After doing some significant research (apparently, as i would find out later, this “significant” research that i did was apparently insufficient), i tracked down what i needed for shrimping:

• a valid shell fishing license
• a boat
• some shrimp pots
• at least 400′ of rope per pot
• a pot puller
• at least a buoy per pot
• a bait cage/bag per pot
• some shrimp bait

Getting the shell fishing license was the easiest part. I have been getting the shell fishing license for almost every year since i moved to Seattle close to 5 years ago, so i know exactly where, what and how to get it: Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife website.

Finding out where i could rent a boat took me quite a bit more time that i anticipated. I first tried to contact via email the author of the Seattle Times article to determine if the folks from the Hama Hama Oyster company that took her out shrimping would provide the same service to some shrimping newbies. She never wrote back. So i called Hama Hama Oyster company and was informed that they only took her out because she was a close friend. So i scratched that off the list. On searching for boat rental/charter on google, i found a few hits. None of the boat charter businesses that i contacted provide any shrimping boat rental/charter. Eventually, i managed to find two boat rental places: one in Hoodsport called Rest-A-While RV Park and another one in Union called Hood Canal Kayak. Originally, i wanted to go with Rest-A-While since it is located right where i was suggested to drop the shrimp pots. But Hood Canal Kayak has a better boat rental rate. Instead of paying $250 for a full day rental (i only needed 4 hours since WDFW was only allowing shrimping to be done between 0900 and 1300 on 6/23), i only have to pay $150 at Hood Canal Kayak.

At the same time i was searching for a boat rental business, i was also trying to determine where i could get all the shrimping equipment in Seattle. Since it’s already at the very tail end of the recreational shrimping season in Washington, quite a few stores had sold out on items like shrimp pots and bait cages. This would be my first time shrimping so initially, i did not see any reason to buy shrimp pots. Furthermore, i have absolutely no space at home to store any 30″ shrimp pots. I found a shrimping/crabbing business in Brinnon (about 4o miles north of Union) that was willing to rent shrimp pots. I did not feel like driving a round trip of more than 80 miles just to pick up the shrimp pots and then another 80 to return them, and after discussing with Janet (she would be my only shrimping partner), i decided to buy them. Since i was out of town in Rhode Island the whole week and would not return in time to buy the shrimping equipment, Janet was kind enough to get most of them from Seattle Marine and Fishing Supply Co.

I was concerned about navigating the Hood Canal so i got myself a Garmin GPS 72 handheld GPS navigator. This is probably the most basic model of handheld GPS navigator made by Garmin. It would be nice if the GPS 72 comes with topographic maps but since i only needed a tool to tell me how to get to some designated waypoints, i didn’t think it was necessary to pay more for other fancier features. In addition, the GPS 72 is designed with marine use in mind. If you accidentally drop the GPS 72 in the water, it will simply float.

I got up on 6/23 at around 0600 in the morning, having slept for no more than 4 hours since i was busy getting things ready for the shrimping trip the previous night. For the trip from Seattle to Union, i drove south on I-5 until i reached Olympia and then northwest on highway 101 before going east on highway 106. It was a pleasant drive that took less than 2 hours. Hood Canal Kayak has two locations in Union and i was told to pick up my rental boat at the Alderbrook Resort. After loading all the shrimping equipment onto the 11.5 ft boat and getting some basic instructions on how to operate the motor, Janet and i headed off toward Hoodsport.

It was a sunny but cloudy morning when we left the dock at the Alderbrook Resort. The water was calm and it was not windy at all - the weather forecast had called for 15 MPH wind. My original plan was to head to the water east of Hoodsport to drop our shrimp pots but when we spotted a few boats dropping pots south of Hoodsport, we decided to drop some shrimp pots near them. Darker clouds were gathering and it was getting a little bit windier. After loading the first shrimp pot with three cans of cat food and tying the pot to one end of the 400 ft roll of rope with an anchor hitch (which i learned the previous evening) and tying the yellow buoy to the other end with a stopper knot, we started to drop the pot into the water.

Immediately, i realized a problem. Because the shrimp pot was weighing no more than 6 lbs, the strong current was causing the pot to drift south. Without any depth finder, there was no way for us to figure out the water depth. Even when we had almost completely rolled out 400 ft of rope, there was still a strong tug on the rope. We were really concerned that if we let the rope go, we would have to kiss our shrimp pots good bye. When another shrimp boat came close to us, i asked the crew for the water depth: 360 ft. As much concern as we had in the shrimp pot dragging the buoy down, we let the first pot go. A few minutes later, we released the second pot.

As soon as they were released, they started drifting south. I knew immediately that it was impossible to catch any shrimp with the shrimp pots drifting and possibly not even touching the bottom. So we gave chase to the buoys and started to pull them out of the water. It was relatively easy to pull the first 100 ft but it began to feel a lot heavier soon after. It was then we realized that somehow the ropes for the two shrimp pots got tangled up. Naturally, as i had expected, both pots did not contain any shrimp.

After moving the boat to a group of boats shrimping in the water further south, we asked the people on one of the boats for the recommended weight on the shrimp pots. We were told that the shrimp pots should weigh probably 20 lbs or more. Without anything on the boat that would allow us to add additional weights to the shrimp pots, i decided to steer the boat to the eastern shore of Hood Canal to pick up some rocks on the beach. I picked up 6 rocks weighing from 5 to 10 lbs from what i thought was a private beach. Getting back to the boat was not as easy as i thought. I had to make sure that the boat was in a relatively safe distance from a huge under water rock and that the water was deep enough to start the motor up. I didn’t realize at that moment that i had my Sony Ericsson K608i in my pants pocket. I can tell you now that the K608i is not waterproof. Soaking it in seawater rendered it completely unusable. Anyway, in the first pot, i placed a 5-lb rock wrapped in old t-shirt (i didn’t want to take any chance for the rock to do any damage to the net on the pot). It was obvious after dropping the shrimp pot into the water that even with the added weight, the shrimp pot was still too light. For the second pot, i added two heavier rocks, again wrapped in old t-shirts. The heavier pot seemed to drift less than the lighter pot.

Next, we chased after the lighter pot, with the goal of pulling it up and adding a second rock. By this time, the added rock in the pot was making it quite a bit harder to pull. The pot puller that Janet bought could not be mounted onto the boat so we (mainly me) were pulling by hand. The current, which was causing the pot to drift south, was requiring extra effort be exerted in pulling the pot. When i finally pulled the pot onto the boat, to our utter amazement, there was a big spot shrimp in the pot!!! I have absolutely no freaking idea how the spot shrimp managed to get into our shrimp pot since it had been drifting from where we dropped it.

(The only spot shrimp that we caught. Amazingly, it was not crushed by the T-shirt-wrapped rock.)

After putting the shrimp in a bucket, i quickly added a second rock to the pot and proceeded to drop it. After dropping about 200 ft of rope, i realized that we simply did not have enough time. By this time, it was close to 1230. All the shrimp pots must be pulled out of the water by 1300 and also, we had to return our boat by 1300. So the decision was made to pull the pot up. By now, it was getting quite difficult to pull the pot up, even wearing my gloves. I had to take a break after about 15-20 pulls. Eventually, after much work, we brought the pot onto the boat.

Next, we went after the second pot. I was not looking forward to pulling that pot up at all because that pot was loaded with two of the heaviest rocks. With much grunting, screaming and yelling, and with plenty of breaks in between 10 pulls or so, i managed to pull about 300 ft of rope. While i was resting my sore fingers, i suggested to Janet that we should both pull the pot at the same time. It was definitely easier pulling it up by two persons and by the time we pulled the pot out of the water, i realized close to 20 minutes had gone. I think it took us another 20 minutes to get the boat back to the dock. The trip back to the dock was done without the help of the Garmin GPS 72 since i could not remember the name of the waypoint in which i had saved the dock coordinates!

After taking a quick shower at the resort, we stopped by a roadside BBQ stand for some pretty good BBQ. I had a BBQ pork sandwich while Janet had 1/2 a pound of ribs.

I learned the following lessons, some of them the hard way, in my first ever shrimping trip:

• Shrimp pots must weigh at least 25 lbs. Anything lighter, you may not be lucky enough to even get a single shrimp like me.
• A pot puller, preferably a motorized one, is a must, if you don’t want your fingers to be red and swollen like mine now.


(No points for guessing which of my fingers that did most of the work)

• Have your own boat or know someone who has one. Otherwise, this will be one expensive activity.
• Learn how to use the GPS navigator BEFORE the trip.
• If you are only allowed to start shrimping at 0900, arrive at the drop location and get the shrimp pots ready by 0900.
• Get a plastic pan or container so that when you are trying to poke holes into the cans of cat food, they don’t spill all over the boat, leaving both you and the boat smelling like cat food.
• If you want the shrimps to stay alive on the journey home, it is not necessary to put them in water. The only shrimp that we caught was alive for more than 8 hours after being left in the cooler with ice.

Related posts

• No Related Post