My dad invited me and the kids to go crabbing and snapper fishing this morning. We went down to the Belmar Marina and rented two boats. My son Sean who loves to crab said we should have just gone to Marine Park in Red Bank, where we always catch crabs. In Shark River We tried several approaches to catch dinner, and none turned out well. First, I spared the kids and left all my silly fly rods home. That got me points right off the bat. So I drifted a squid and Gulp! combo through the channels and flats and didn't pick up a short. Then we used bunker in both drop lines and traps and managed 4 small and female crabs. Then, well we all got lucky. The snappers were blitzing, and we were on them. We used spearing and poppers and caught about twenty, the biggest maybe 7 inches. About 3/4 of the way through the trip my son Sean quit. He likes to catch and eat crabs. This wasn't working for him. We got back to the dock around two and the kid at the dock asked us how we did. He said a few others boats got a fish here and their maybe two keepers all morning. I told him we were really trying to catch crabs, and with that he said, " You have to go to Barnegat Bay or Red Bank for that, crabbings not that good here!" Sean won.
