Crabbing from a zodiac?

[Bytal]

Anyone have any suggestions or concerns in regards to crabbing from an inflatable? I've been crabbing at my friends place in secehlt with his aluminum boat for years but I now have an 11 ft zodiac and was wondering how safe it is dragging traps up in an inflatable boat. I have a couple of the 24" square traps with about 70ft of line on each so I pull by hand. Obviously dragging the rope right over the side of an inflatable would be a bad idea. I've seen those Scotty manual line ease devices which mounts to a rod holder mount and puts the pulley out past the edge of the boat. Would this work well with an inflatable? I was wondering it it would put too much load on the side tube if I'm dragging up a heavy trap. The boat material seems fairly sturdy so I don' see a crab puncturing the boat, mostly concerned about overloading the side tube or catching the boat with the trap pulling it up.

Thanks.

 

[SteelyDan]

Done it with a buddy in his. Works fine. He had a scotty trap ease and we found that it really buckled the inflatable. My thought was to mount a scotty rod holder base solid on the transom.

 

[tubber]

You could attach the scotty pulley to the rod holder on the end of the wood.

 

[Daveroo]

I did it regularly when I was younger. I just hauled up the trap by hand without rubbing the line along my raft. A good quality raft is pretty solid and hard to damage. Never worried about damage with my inflatable hypalon raft.

 

[Old Blue]

I did it for years with crab and prawn traps, just pull along the rub rails and don't worry.
If using the stainless steel traps or older cracked coated ones maybe throw done a towel or 2 just to be safe when you're under power plus it keeps things from sliding.
At times I would have 4 prawn traps, 2 crab traps, lines and floats, FF, 2 rods and gear plus my DR hanging off the back in my 10ft Avon....hilarious to think about now

 

[trophywife]

bring an old car floor mat and drape it over the side for rope rub.

 

[Sharphooks]

I pull pots from an Avon inflatable: two things:

It doesn't hurt to lash down a plywood platform on the bow: good support for your pots; keeps the sharp edges away from your pontoons in waves

A square of rug hanging over the side to prevent rope burn is good advice. I cut a large square of hypalon and glued it just above the rubbing strake. Between the strake and two layers of hypalon, my pontoons are good

 

[Bytal]

Thanks for the suggestions guys. I may have another rod holder mount somewhere. Maybe I can mount the pot puller to the transom. I'll have to dig out some old floor mats as well and now I have a use for the piece of plywood that's been in the garage for years.

 

[Brent Doornenbal]

I have set crab traps with a paddle board so zodiac will be no issue !