THE CRAB FISHERIES. 643 



name of channel crabs, but they are not much in demand as food. In the summer they 

 inhabit tho sounds and iulets as well as the outer shores, and in the winter bed iu the bottom 

 dt I lie channels and also in deep water. The season lasts from May until November, during which 

 time the crabs may be captured iu large numbers with little trouble. 



About Beaufort and Morehead City, the fishermen take them in immense numbers in their 

 drag-nets while fishing for sea-trout, mullet, and other fish, and consider them a great annoyance, 

 as it is difficult to remove them from the nets. They kill nearly all that are captured iu this way 

 by a blow from a stick carried along for the purpose, and then throw them away, or use them 

 as a manure. A few are kept for food, but none are sold, beyond an occasional barrel-full, mostly 

 soft-shelled, which are sent to some of the larger inland towns. A few soft crabs are also sent to 

 northern markets, but most of the crabs sold in this vicinity are gathered by negro children, who 

 take them on the ebb tide in the little pools of water left on the shore. The price is from 15 to 20 

 cents per dozen. The fishery for this crab promises to become of great importance when a ready 

 market for the catch has been established. Great inducements are held out by this region for the 

 establishment of crab canneries, similar to those of Hampton, Va. The trot-line employed on the 

 Virginia coast has not yet been introduced here. The total quantity of crabs used in this vicinity 

 (Beaufort and Morehead City), or sent from there in 1875, was about 2,500 dozen, valued at 15 cents 

 a dozen, or $375 for the entire catch. 



A small quantity of crabs is secured about Wilmington for use in that city and for shipment 

 to interior towns of North Carolina and South Carolina. They are sent either alive in baskets or 

 after being boiled iu brine. 



But few men on this coast engage regularly in crab catching, and most of the crabs sold are 

 taken by the fishermen or by colored children. Shrimps and prawns constitute the favorite baits 

 for hook and line fishing on the North Carolina coast, but in their absence crabs are substituted 

 in part. They are said to answer for nearly all species offish. 



SOUTH CAROLINA. The sea-crabs, as the Callinectes are called on this coast, are found 

 in abundance during the warmer part of the year, in the harbors, in the shallow waters at the 

 months of creeks and rivers, and on the salt marshes, where many individuals are sometimes left 

 exposed at low tide. They might generally be taken during nearly every month of the year, but 

 are secured for market principally in the spring' and early summer. Soft crabs are found on the 

 sandy and muddy flats at low tide. 



Crab fishing as an industry is carried on only in the vicinity of Charleston, where the fishery 

 usually begins about the last of February and continues until the middle of May. After open 

 winters, however, it often commences several weeks earlier. The crabs are usually taken by 

 means of trot lines, 75 to 100 yards long, baited generally with beef entrails at intervals of 18 

 inches to 2 feet. Scoop-nets are used in connection with the trot-lines, and crabs are also taken 

 incidentally in fish seines. During the first few weeks of the season the number secured is com- 

 paratively small, 150 to 200 being a fair day's catch for a boat containing two men. Later in the 

 season they become more abundant, the average daily catch per boat of two men reaching 400 to 

 fiOO. The best fishing-grounds for hard crabs are about the rocky bottoms of the outer harbor, in 

 the vicinity of Forts Sumter and Piuckney, though the crabs are also fairly abundant nearly 

 everywhere along the shore. About eight boats, with ten men and six boys, are engaged in crab- 

 bing during the season. The first part of the season the fishermen sell their catch of hard crabs 

 at $1 a hundred from the boat, but later the price falls to 60 cents a hundred. The retail price is 

 25 cents per dozen. The trade is largely controlled by colored people, who buy the crabs directly 

 from the fishermen, and after boiling them and scraping tho spawn from the females, place them on 



