Yellowfish

Hello. What is the best way to fish crabs for yellowfish in rapids or close to them in the Vaal River? I heard people throw in a crab with no weight and let it drift and then other people say to throw behind a rock with a sliding trace. How do you rig the crab for smallmouth and largemouth and how to catch the crabs ?
Thanks!

Hi very easy way to catch crabs is with pichard on a hook let it sink to the bottom for a few minutes the crabs will attach its self onto the bait..then you pull out ur line..another option is also using a small net with bait inside.

He asked hoe to fish crabs not how to catch them. Im also onterested to know

Hi all,

To rig a crab, tear off the 1st and 4th leg against the crabs body and push the hook through the pockets created, where the legs were. Don't go to deep through the body itself to keep the crab alive. Crabs the size of a R5 coin and smaller are the best. If crabs are bigger than a R5 tear the pinchers of as well, as they tend to fight back with the fish.

Ill try and attach a pic of my rig. But in short I take a few old sinkers and melt it down and cast my own with an old teaspoon. The flat teaspoon shaped sinkers is not so easily pushed in the current, and helps lift the rig of the rocky bottom when reeling in.

Hopes this helps.

Hopes this helps.

Ok, not a everyday venture, yellow fishing!!!

so we do fish for them in the summer rains.
we do not fish the big rivers as we can normally see the fish feeding in the small streams.

so what we do is, go to a stream which has a flood plain, which has scattered rocks.
all you need to do is lift the rocks and find the crabs.
big ones and small ones, it does not matter.

if you cannot get crabs, then fish with earth worms or termites.

like i said, we can normally see them feeding.

we would use a j-hook and about 40-60cm above the j-hook we would place a wine cork inline.

because it is sight fishing, we stand on the edge of the stream and then place the baited hook inside the water and letting it flow with the current.

it is normally fast flowing streams, so we only place the bait out, follow it until the slack is taken up and then we place it again higher up in the stream.

just watch the cork, it normally goes down with a bang.

the other area we do target is where the fast running stream goes into a wider area.
there we will cast out the cork with the crab.
let it drift down current and here we will let out line, to cause a natural moving bait.

you will be surprised how hard they take the bait.
even the smaller ones do not play.

we also do not use the whole crab, but rather pieces of it. we were fishing more for small mouth but we did succeed in getting a large mouth too.

so if you do get a small crab, we would normally break off all the legs, break open the shell and only use the meat inside of the shell.
let me see if i can find a picture of the ones we caught earlier this year.

i hope this helps.

Will this work where there are rapids in the Vaal? Having luck with the pictures?

Marcus123 wrote:

Will this work where there are rapids in the Vaal? Having luck with the pictures?

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We have applied similar method, by using our fly lines, strike indicator and no.2 J-hook. The reason for fly line or float is to cover more water during the presentation.
We have found that we normally get the hits at the end of the rapid as the water slows down and deposit the heavier particles. We normally use smaller crabs and cut in half.
We also do not do a full cast, a roll cast is normally sufficient.
The above was all done in the Vaal i.e. Geelvis Paradys and Barrage.

Or just take up flyfishing and use a flexo or contraband crab pattern

Fin-S wrote:

Or just take up flyfishing and use a flexo or contraband crab pattern

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I've fly fished the Vaal extensively with conventional patterns and nymphing, and is my preferred method. Mustard Caddis no.14, and Flashback Nymph (no.16). Flashback must be UV.
I have seen guys that are very good proving to us that there are fish and we are just not getting our flies down, by putting on a crab and drifting is down the same lanes we do and VAS.
Guys like Turner Wilkinson are very good on the Vaal.

deisel wrote:

He asked hoe to fish crabs not how to catch them. Im also onterested to know

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He did also ask hoe o catch crabs

River crabs, the best is to find flat the water edge, lift them and either the crab is in the surface below the rock or in a pocket in the mud below the rock

Thanks guys! Could not manage to find small crabs (R5) only caught big ones.... cracked open the shell removed pinchers. Cut the body in 4 pieces (these crab’s meat section was about 4x4cm ...big) hooked thru where one leg was removed as told with small carp hook. Used 2 rigs : 3way swivel to hook and sinker and then balsinker that slid above swivel 30cm to hook. Got no bites on the crabs... fished mainly in the river.. sat on big rocks haha. I casted not far from me as there was a lot of slack in the line( not further than 5m)Caught 2 really small yellows on earthworm(judging how they bite they should have been monsters!!) and the attached one on a white chocolate floatie. I have no idea where to cast or what to look for... tight lines!!

Marcus123 wrote:

Thanks guys! Could not manage to find small crabs (R5) only caught big ones.... cracked open the shell removed pinchers. Cut the body in 4 pieces (these crab’s meat section was about 4x4cm ...big) hooked thru where one leg was removed as told with small carp hook. Used 2 rigs : 3way swivel to hook and sinker and then balsinker that slid above swivel 30cm to hook. Got no bites on the crabs... fished mainly in the river.. sat on big rocks haha. I casted not far from me as there was a lot of slack in the line( not further than 5m)Caught 2 really small yellows on earthworm(judging how they bite they should have been monsters!!) and the attached one on a white chocolate floatie. I have no idea where to cast or what to look for... tight lines!!

Click to expand...

Well done, on your way to figuring out the smallies. Fish either the rapids or the pools where the rapids subside. During winter as the water cools, fish the deeper pools where the water temperature is more stable. where there is slower flow, I have caught them on a ball sinker with a 30cm trace, and a little float about 3 fingers above the crab. For this I use circle hooks as they do not get stuck so frequently. In summer fish the rapids when the water is warmer without a float and 50cm leader and circle hook.
Yes, they take of like lightning.

Cool! Will try next time 🙂👍🏼