New Partnership to Tackle Invasive Crays

This is a dedicated thread for discussing article: New Partnership to Tackle Invasive Crays

I've long thought about trapping signals for the pot. Has anyone on FM had any experience of doing this?

Yes trap and eat them. They were brought in by the food trade I think. A concerted effort to market them to the public might make them a fashion food and a sought after commodity and reduce the numbers drastically. Or am I being simplistic?

john step said:

Yes trap and eat them. They were brought in by the food trade I think. A concerted effort to market them to the public might make them a fashion food and a sought after commodity and reduce the numbers drastically. Or am I being simplistic?

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Dont know John...but there are places I know [and used to fish but dont anymore] where there are so many you'd need a crane to lift any trap out. I seriously doubt trapping would have any noticeable,sustained impact. I've read a few studies etc and it seems the damned things are almost impossible to kill. You can poison them but in order to get the signals you kill everything else too which is kind of missing the point.The only thing that appears to have had any degree of success is male sterlisation....trap the big males,zap their nuts & return them.

Should have jumped on these things years ago before they got established. I fear it is too late now.

MarkTheSpark said:

I've long thought about trapping signals for the pot. Has anyone on FM had any experience of doing this?

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I trap them now and then but to be honest Mark, for my money, the hassle in preparing them to eat makes it a bit of a chore. I'm not sure the rewards justify the effort tbh. I reckon you need thirty or forty good sized crays per person for a decent meal. That's a lot of de-shelling and claw busting.

I tried applying for a licence in order to keep it legal but found out that the EA expect you to apply for a licence on each and every occasion that you intend trapping. And the licence is date specific. So frankly I don't bother.

---------- Post added at 19:46 ---------- Previous post was at 19:43 ----------

S-Kippy said:

Dont know John...but there are places I know [and used to fish but dont anymore] where there are so many you'd need a crane to lift any trap out. I seriously doubt trapping would have any noticeable,sustained impact. I've read a few studies etc and it seems the damned things are almost impossible to kill. You can poison them but in order to get the signals you kill everything else too which is kind of missing the point.The only thing that appears to have had any degree of success is male sterlisation....trap the big males,zap their nuts & return them.

Should have jumped on these things years ago before they got established. I fear it is too late now.

Click to expand...

A couple of years back a local trout club trapped 120,000 from a relatively small beat on a pretty small river. Within a few months you could trap as many as before their operation from there.

They are a chore ("E-e-e-u-w, urgh, shells, they'll ruin my nailjob...."), but the curried and barbecued Signal tails that I had at a Thames-side garden party only a very few years ago left me thinking "Trap and eat the lot of them ... it's the least we can do....".

Send in the Otters!!

oh wait, they have :wh

Otters (in fashion parlance), not the New Black, but the New Eels. I think we're going to need them.