Here's a couple of posts from a few years ago that may help:
They also limit the number of commercial licenses. What has change slightly is the lobstermen are now aided by computers and equipment that can now track the bugs better, and, they go where the bugs are. This is why some areas seem so thick and it appears there are more traps. The record catch was with the same trap limits we've had for years. It was just a great year for bugs.
As an ex-commercial lobsterman I would suggest a hook knife as your first line of defense. Sailors Solutions sells them and they WORK. The WORST thing you can do to a lobsterman is to spend time trying to free his gear from your boat while the wind or current are dragging his string across 6 or 7 other strings.
Cutting a $4.00-$10.00 pot buoy is much less costly to the fisherman than dragging his string over multiple other guys and costing them hours of work untangling plus the hundreds of feet of tangled warp..
These guys almost always run a pot buoy at either end of string and the odds both will be cut are extremely rare. Never happened to me and I fished traps at the mouth of the Piscataqua river in NH/Maine which is and was very heavily traveled.
Sailing among them is not difficult but does require more attention than most are used to, especially if you're not from Maine.
The worst thing is the floating warp that gets sucked off the beaches and back into the water after a moon tide. This warp was often discarded when lobsterman were dealing with string tangles, often caused by boaters dragging their gear across the bottom.. Thankfully floating warp has been banned but there is still plenty of it out there on shorelines that wind up back in the bays after a moon tide. If you hit it, floating warp, you'll have never seen it until it is too late and Spurs and shaft cutters DO NOT always work on these balls of poly line, nor do hook knifes....
I personally dislike line cutters and no longer use them as they are not 100% effective. I actually cut myself very badly when I had to dive on one and it was about 1cm from my main artery in my wrist. They can be VERY dangerous if they fail to cut the line and you need to dive. If you sail in Maine you should be prepared to get in the water.
When diving it's a good idea to wear a dive hood to lessen the impact of head bangs on the underside of the hull. I once tore a huge chunk of skin off my head when the hull came smashing down on it in lumpy seas. I also always dive with the knife on a lanyard and a safety line tied to a stern cleat. This is a line I can grab easily if off shore or in lots of current. Drooping a dock line from the port stern cleat to stbd stern cleat under the boat fore of the rudder, on fin keels, gives you a good place to hang onto while cutting line from the prop. This can work on full keels too but you just need to go deeper with the line.
When sailboats snag a pot on a shaft or rudder, and think they are doing a favor by trying to get it off without cutting it, they usually are only making things worse.
Today's wire traps are very light weight and dragging ten of them is no problem for a boat with sails up or one in wind and current. Often times what happens is the boat drifts, and drags the the string across a few others. This makes a HUGE, HUGE mess!!
I used to run pot buoys on both ends of my string, as most all fisherman do. Not once did I ever loose both ends at the same time. Replacing a pot buoy is FAR cheaper than loosing 300 feet of warp to a tangle and the time involved in re-rigging a string..
Toggles:
As far as toggles go the old excuse is that they are used to keep the line from tangling the bottom or a rock. This is pure BS.. This excuse is worn out and is not even close to why they actually use them. Most fisherman use them out of habit & history and because the more they use them the more pot buoys they lose due to line cuts. It is a self fulfilling/defeating idea. If they used no toggles, as they do in Casco Bay & points West of Muscongus, they would lose a lot less pot buoys. Sadly old habits die hard and fishermen are a stale & crusty old bunch whom are also very, very resistant to change. They keep using toggles so that when the main pot buoy gets cut they can still boat hook the toggle. Sadly we have not one State rep or Senator with the balls to take this subject on.
If you want to see just how much BS the "keep the line off the bottom" theory is just note how many of the toggles are still floating & laying rather flat on the surface at high tide. Based on teh argument for toggle buoy use that toggle should be 10-14 feel below the surface at high tide to keep the line off the bottom.
I have actually argued against the use of these toggles, from a boater safety standpoint, and as an ex-commercial fisherman, to my state rep and Senator, but they were both was unwilling to submit a bill to ban them. I know others who've done the same. There is zero legitimate reason for their use, they way they are currently used, and they only lead to more pot buoys being cut off. Thus, the fisherman think they are a good idea, and the viscous circle begins again..
Far less pot buoys are cut off in areas where they don't use them. In my thousands & thousands of pulls, without toggles, I never once had a line snag the bottom, ever. Toggles are pure BS..
Here are a few tips on how to deal with lobster pots:
#1 ALWAYS try to pass to the down current, down wind or down tide side of the pot buoy. Never intentionally pass above a lobster pot unless you absolutely know you have the room to do so. They have an uncanny way of letting you know which way is up current, wind or tide and which way is down. Follow the stick or the wake..
This one is pointing or angled towards "down tide" so you'll pass to where the stick leans or points. This is about a 1.5 knot current at the mouth of Penobscot Bay and well off Vinalhaven and Northhaven Islands. We were miles from the nearest land yet Pen Bay has HUGE amounts of water to spill & fill and he currents can run miles out to sea.. Never intentionally pass a pot like this to the up tide or up current side!!!
#2 Wear polarized sunglasses! My daughter had grabbed my Maui Jim's and got "snack goo" all over them. Rather than clean them I stupidly grabbed my "guest" pair of sunglasses, a non-polarized pair of Ray Ban's.
As you can see we almost hit this pot that was pulled under by the tidal current. My maneuver was late because I never saw it until the absolute last second. At that point I had no choice but to turn hard stbd and pass to the up-current side which as you can see could have been very dangerous. Again, wear polarized sunglasses. You will see these submerged pots well before you will with non-polarized glasses. My camera had a polarizing filter so I snapped that as we passed.
#3 Just because it's calm does not mean the pots are not still trying to tell you something. Current & tide still exists even in flat glass conditions. Note the direction of the "sticks"...
#4 It may be calm but this pot has a decent current flowing by it. Just look at the "wake" made by the buoy..
The Guy From "Away" Quote:
I passed too close to a lobster guy and he was swearing at me and really pissed off. How do I avoid pissing these guys off?
First you need to look for his or her "
colors" then spot his/her pots on the water and as a courtesy. For your own safety you should remember that many of these guys are
outlaw cowboys, get away from them as the boat is likely moving to the next pot that matches the displayed colors and they could care less where you are or where you're going. COLREGS don't apply to these guys, as they see it.
Lobstermen are required to display their "colors" or one of their own pot buoys mounted up high on the boat so it can be seen.
Note the pot buoy above the radome:
Note the "colors" on the port side wheel house roof:
Note the "colors" laying on the wheel house roof behind the spot light & hanging dead center also look on the water and you'll see two more of his/her pots.. stay away from them:
Pot buoy/colors located on stern end port side of wheel house roof:
When you see a lobster boat with a deck full of 3-8 traps be very cautious as they could be ready to "lay a string". Depeding upon the zone all the trap strings will always be laid in a compass course. In this area it is NW to SE. You can often spot the end string pot buoys once you line up the correct coordinates.
This guy was ready to lay a short string so I grabbed my camera to film it. We can see the sudden turn to line up and head NW. The end string buoy goes out first, already dragging behind the boat, then the fist trap and then the successive traps are automatically yanked off the stern as the boat moves in the lay direction. Finally the last end string buoy is pulled or tossed over.
DO NOT GET IN THE WAY OF A GUY LAYING A STRING!!!! HE WILL LIKELY PLOW YOU OVER.
