How to take the kids crabbing this summer

We've found a new hobby.

It's cheap, it appears to amuse the kids (and adults!) for hours and it happens in the great gorgeous seasidey (not a word?!) outdoors.

What is not to love?

As you'll know if you've read previous blogs of ours - my children and their friends are complete beach combers / beach rakers/ general sea scrapers.

Give us a sunny day and sometimes even a cloudy one and you can probably find us on Tankerton Slopes picnicking by the sea and having a paddle.

But we've upped the ante in the past few weeks and introduced them to crabbing.

Aged at now four and six, it's an activity that both Oscar and Liv can manage almost solely by themselves as long as someone has hold of the back of a hoodie or swimming costume to stop them toppling over the side!

I have such fond memories from my own childhood of hanging off sea walls during holidays in Cornwall desperate for a good catch and it's something which I've been desperate to pass on.

We've bought them each their own nets and lines for very few pounds, it keeps the bickering at bay (always a winner!) and is a bit of good clean - if not slightly fishy - fun that we do as a family and with our friends which gives you that fuzzy 'glad to be alive' kind of feeling when you find yourself dragging off a sea-soaked jetty happy, sunkissed, grubby faces who have been learning about marine life and eating chips on the beach until bedtime.

If the sound of it floats your boat and you've yet to take your family, we've put together what we think are our top tips for a cracking Kent crabbing adventure:

1 Find a suitable spot

Unless you wish to go fishing about in rock pools you need a spot high enough from the water to be able to drop a line into.

Our personal favourite is a jetty on Whitstable beach at something which is close to high tide but Hampton Pier in Herne Bay and Folkestone Harbour I am told are both equally good crabbing hot spots.

2 Equipment

You will need a line, a net and a bucket. The combined total of which is probably under £5 if you wish to buy it at a seaside shop.

Equally we have seen people fashion a crab line from a piece of fishing line and a washing tablet bag (where you need to put the bait!).

But either way it's all reusable time after time so it isn't a massive outlay and should last you all summer.

3 Bait

Bacon, ham or fish seems to work for us.

A particularly stinky and out of date packet of ham once saved at the back of the fridge for a crabbing occasion led to a record breaking catch - but I'm not sure whether this was more by luck than anything to do with some slightly squiffy meat!

4 Fill your bucket

Before you start remember to fill your bucket with sea water, maybe some seaweed and a few pebbles to make a crab-like home.

The girls in my fishing crew take particular care creating crab habitat - the same can not always be said for Oscar who is always desperate to get fishing.

And be careful not to overload your bucket with creatures if you're on a roll. The boy may not be in tune with crab housing but Oscar says no more than 8-10 in a bucket because it makes them unhappy.

5 Get started

Fill your bait bag, drop you line in and when you feel the line get slightly heavy or sense a crab nibble, gently lift your line from the water and put the net underneath to catch the dangling sea creatures.

Do it too quickly or pull your line out too rapidly and they are likely to lose their grip and fall back into the sea.

You can either place your net directly into the bucket and edge them out or if you have an Oscar who insists on collecting every one by hand hold them with your finger and thumb on either side of their shell.

You should collect them from behind the pincers so they can't reach you and you don't hurt them because if they do grab a hold - it can be very difficult to get them to let go.

Good luck!

Lauren x