crayfish

Chill

Chill

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While on our annual up river holiday got chatting to a chap on a NB moored behind us who had traps out. He showed me two beauties he had caught and cooked, looked like mini Lobsters. Are these only on the upper Thames? Anyone else been catching and eating them?
 
Yes, they are delicious! Not sure how widespread they are on the Thames, be surprised if they aren't everywhere though.
Be aware that you do need a (free) permit to trap though, and the traps have to be otter-safe (specs and approved traps can be found online)
Google will reveal all.
 
if they are the USA Red Signal crayfish they are an invasive species, causing increasing and massive damage to native crayfish and e.g. trout and salmon, and also the river banks because they burrow..
We have been trapping signal crayfish on Exmoor for nearly three years to try and remove them from our rivers.

British crayfish are under threat; eat Americans :).
 
Not many left on the River Lee. The Poles caught and exported them all by the look of it!

They taste very average. I tried....
 
Chill said:
While on our annual up river holiday got chatting to a chap on a NB moored behind us who had traps out. He showed me two beauties he had caught and cooked, looked like mini Lobsters. Are these only on the upper Thames? Anyone else been catching and eating them?
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Abingdon by any chance? There's a NB'er that appears to live on the 24hr EA moorings, who catches them for the local restaurants. His boats bristling with pots, there seems to be no shortage of them.
I could be wrong(so please feel free to correct me), but I was told that when this invasive species was first recognised as a bit of a menace, the EA encouraged people to catch as many as possible. As more people participated in the EAs environmental clean up, the EA decided that a special licence would be required to catch them.:rolleyes:
 
There's an enterprising young man in the Abingdon area trapping them by the heavyweight and selling them wholesale in London. A couple or more years back Harleyford MYC arrived here with a couple of hundred they'd caught up river. They BBQ'd them and added garlic butter. Served alone they are rather bland.
If you catch American ones you are not allowed to return them to the river. British ones you MUST return. They have now appeared at Ashmount, in what numbers I don't know.
 
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#1 son lives in Swindon and catches them in the Thames above Lech lade. Our local Chinese/Asian buffet here in the USA serves them daily, but the ones here are somewhat mushy and difficult to peel, however that may be because they are overcooked like their clams which are chewy for same reason-depends on the day and the cook methinks in this case. I had them many times in up market Madrid restaurants in the past and they were very good as were their clams.
 
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prof pat pending said:
This should tell you what you need to know :)

http://www.naturalbushcraft.co.uk/wild-food/signal-crayfish-trapping-and-catching.html
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That may well be accurate for the Thames, but it purports to cover the UK and is wrong in Scotland. Up here it is illegal to be in possession of a live signal crayfish or to trap them for personal consumption or onward sale. SEPA believes the evidence to show that trapping is counterproductive. It is illegal to release a signal crayfish into the wild, so if you catch one accidentally it should be killed and buried.

https://www.sepa.org.uk/media/107509/north_american_signal_crayfish_faq.pdf

I sail - sometimes - on Loch Ken where the signal crayfish invasion has largely destroyed other fish stocks.
 
I taste tested one for lunch today n our local Chinese 'all you can eat seafood buffet' and it was good, sadly when I tried a few more they were overcooked and mushy, not to mention near impossible to peel. I suspect they were bought in Chinese farmed and frozen offerings, neither local nor fresh.
 
The Claw meat tastes OK, while the body is nigh on tasteless, and this is the same with supermarket bought Crayfish too IMHO. You can add chilli and lime etc, but there is little taste, so it's better to eat the Bacon you used on a bit of string to catch them!

Its such a pain having to crack and peel them though, especially if you have cooked a few!

Three minutes in the pan seems enough, otherwise they overcook and go rubbery (Ah So!....no, not 'rubbery)

Various people catching them on the River Lea outside my place appears to have all but decimated them. Nobody bothers anymore, as instead of pulling out sixty an hour, you get nothing at all...
 
Has anyone tried to eat a Thames mussel? i thought I was walking on pebbles in Abingdon when I got in the water. The bottom is a carpet of the things and most are a lot bigger than the mussels you'd find in the supermarket.
Eating one hadn't crossed my mind before(mostly due to the bucket and chuck it brigade), but if Crayfish are edible....
 
I would like to see them in fresh water for a few months to make really sure I'm not eating all the excrement from those 'orrible bank dwellers :ambivalence:
 
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