frozen peeler

is it really necessary to remove the lungs before freezing peeler. have had results with both crab still with their lungs and those without so im still none the wiser

I don't think the fish removes the lungs before eating a crab either!

thats what i say as well, have heard that they decompose faster than the rest of the crab and the fish notice a different in sent or something

The best way to prep peeler for freezing is to remove the lungs first, every last little bit and then rinse under a tap, pat them dry with a paper towel and then wrap them tight in cling film.

Done like this they will last for well over 12 months, perhaps longer. leave the lungs in and the bacteria eats away at the flesh, you can smell the difference between them, believe me.

Your only looking at half a minute in time, is it worth it :wink:

btw.....if I peel a fresh crab to use straight away, I would leave the lungs in.

Tom.

ya thats basicilly the way ive been doing it. the crab i used with the lungs in had only been frozen about a week so maby they were still relatively fresh.

i read a bit in sea angler way back, think it was alan yates said that after being frozen the lungs could be poisonous or something????maybe im wrong but im sure it was along those lines?

what should you do if you buy frozen peelers from a tackle shop with the lungs still on? Just make sure you use them fairly soon?

I also remember something along those lines in S.A. Phil.

col

The lungs aren't poisonous. They always say to remove the lungs from edible crabs because they don't taste particularly nice so maybe it stems from that. Mind you what Rockhopper says about them smelling different when left in is interesting.

Big Phil, your right, apparently the lungs on all crabs are poisionous.

I get rid of them then I have no excuse when I blank :lol: .........Maybe I should leave them on :shock:

I've been reading a lot lately about bass fishing, Darling, Ladle & Vaughan etc and seem to remember one of the authors talking about the different scents from different species of crab (nothing to do with lungs/gills/whatever) but they seemed to think that the scent from velvet peelers was better than that from the common green shore crab - which they said smelled 'bitter'. So, another variable to confuse the already bewildered.

AFAIK the gills aren't poisonous as such - but are the first bit to begin to decompose. If they were poisonous there'd be a lot of really sick fish out there and after millenia of evolution fish would have learned to avoid crab like the plague....

Pat,

I've used Velvet crab, they are deadly IMO more than normal greens, but some like worm over sand eel and some mackerel over squid, whatever makes you feel will work on the day is a help.

Velvets are far harder to find than Green Shore crab and my point is IMHO most anglers tend to think the harder and more scares the bait the better it performs, I don't think so, one example is Mussel, easy to find, its even cheap to buy and can out fish more trusted more expensive baits on some days.

I agree about the lungs and the millenia scenario, I've often thought if a rattle snake bit its own lip, would it die :lol: :lol: :lol: what kills one animal feeds another.

Tom.

Tom,

IMHO, if the fish weren't so darned scarce, the finer points of bait selection would be academic. :lol:

I think peeler velvet probably aren't scarcer than greens, they just hide differently when peeling and need to be searched for accordingly. I'll dig out some info on how and where to look for different species of peeler and post it up asap. Might be of use or interest.

Has anyone had any success using those frozen velvet swimmers that you can sometimes buy? Is it just me or are these things just total Crap??

No your right pete I have found them to be useless. They have little or no scent. Think they are frozen after they have become softies or something. Experimented with them a few years ago along side other baits when there was plenty of fish about and they were the only bait that didnt work. I remember an article in sea angler a few years ago singing their praises for smoothie fishing. I think they said they outfished fresh shore peelers which I can tell you from experience is bull. Thats what I found anyway, someone else may have found them to work for them.

Iv'e tried the velvet swimmers and also found them pretty useless. Caught nothing from beaches or piers with them, the only thing they did work for was one wrasse but they are probably too expensive for that, when mussel,limpets and hardbacks can be gotten for free.

col