How to Shore Fish for Dungeness Crabs in Oregon

Purchase a shellfish license from a local sporting goods store. At the time of publication, the cost for Oregon State residents was $6.50, while the cost for out of state anglers was $16.50. If you are from out of state and are only going crabbing for several days, you can purchase a three-day license for $9.

Choose a location. If it has been raining, take your boat out to the ocean. This is because, as Dungeness crabs are a salt water creature, the fresh water will drive them out of the estuaries and towards the saltier water of the ocean. For ocean crabbing, the season is closed between August 15 and November 30. If you take your boat out to an estuary, bay or coastal river, you can crab all year round. Just pick a sunny day to go out. The best months for catching Dungeness crabs off of the Oregon coast tend to be September, October, November and December.

Secure the chicken or turkey legs properly inside the crab pot. Take a piece of 14 or 16 gauge wire and cut it to about four inches long. Insert the wire through the chicken or turkey leg and re-wrap it around the bone and twist it to itself. What is left is a chicken leg attached to a piece of wire with at least a three-inch end.

Place the leg and wire in the bottom of the crab pot with the end of the wire sticking out. Wrap the remaining end of the wire around the frame of the crab pot until secure.

Check that the pots are secured to their buoys and drop them until they hit the bottom. If you are crabbing from a dock, you are allowed to have up to three pots. An ideal location to find crabs should have very little current. Place your pots at least 100 feet apart. Be sure your lines have enough slack to allow for a higher tide.

Check your pots in a couple of hours. Come back to your pots, turn the engine off on the boat if you are using one, and quickly pull up the pots. If there are no crabs in the pots, move to a different area and try again. Re-bait the pot as necessary.

Sort your crabs wearing thick gloves to avoid being bit or clawed.

Determine the sex of each crab by flipping it upside down to see its abdominal flap. This is the section of shell in the very middle of the crab. The flap on the female is about twice as wide as the flap on a male, and the female is much wider than she is tall.

Measure the size of each crab by taking the ruler and measuring the shell across its widest area. To legally keep a crab, it must be male and measure 5.75 inches along the back of the shell.

Throw the females and small males promptly back into the water. You are allowed to take home 12 legal size male crabs per day in Oregon.