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Drinkr23: Do you miss the Derby or do you like the way it is now?
Keith Colburn: I miss the Derby. I miss the Derby big time. The crab fishery has changed in the last two years. The Derby was a wide open, best boat wins, every man for himself. The new fishery has a whole new set of struggles that we go through that make it just as intense as the old fishery, only different.
Miginator9: So what is it like getting a boat registered for fishing? I imagine it's really hard.
Keith Colburn: There are a lot of licenses and documentation behind putting a vessel into the fleet. My list of expiration dates is immense. Maintaining constant vigilance to avoid having something expire and not being able to participate in the fishery is a real battle.
Whiyelion: What was the longest you stayed out?
Keith Colburn: If you mean the longest I have been away from home, 11 months. The longest I've been out on the water without delivering back to town, 1 month.
Miginator9: Do you have much contact with any of the other captains?
Keith Colburn: Yes, absolutely. Modern technology has changed the way we work with radars, plotters and especially now communications. We literally have real-time communication on the ground at all times. It's easy to get distracted and chase radio crabs. A radio crab is that elusive crab that doesn't exist but your partner or enemy is trying to set you on.
Darceelou: Hello Keith, when you are all playing jokes on each other, does anyone ever take it seriously and get mad?
Keith Colburn: Absolutely, yes. I do not like people hauling my crab pots. Whenever crab pots get hauled by somebody else, many times they will set it in the wrong position and it may be tangled with one of my own pots or somebody else's pots, or it may be out of line. We set strings of pots in a line for a reason. Many times, weather plays a big factor in how we set our strings of crab pots. When I come back to my pots, if one is out of line and the weather is bad I may have to make adjustments to haul that pot, which could potentially put my crew in jeopardy with waves coming over the sides of the boat. The Wizard , although very large, also has a downside - all four tanks are always full, it rides low to the water, and is very susceptible to taking waves. If my crew is busy untangling a prank and the weather is poor, this could potentially put them in jeopardy.
Black duck: What is the speed of your boat? And how fast are y'all pulling and setting pots?
Keith Colburn: The boat travels at 10 knots, which is approximately 11 mph. We haul pots at about 4 mph. This sounds really slow, but with everything involved there's always a ton of activity going on in trying to get pots back, pots baited, the crab sorted, and throwing the hook at the next pot. We can haul as many as 20 pots per hour, or better.
