Prawn pot doors

[Breaking_Shimanos]

I picked up a square vinyl coated wire mesh pot that has the prawn doors on each of the 4 sides but the door is too wide. Ive been pulling countless crabs out with very little or no prawns. Even pulled a rock fish out once so far.

Ive seen some of the round stackable commi style of trap that have the round ring entrance that is about 3" wide and some traps online that are similar to with one i have (square wire mesh) but have much smaller entances. The current door size on my trap is about 6", but I plan to pick up some wire mesh and zip tie it to make the entrance smaller. How small i shoud go?

 

[jim morrow]

I get fish and crabs trying to come in also.
1 idea; divide or partition off that 6" hole into 4 by putting wire or ty-raps across it.
idea 2; make a smaller oval opening about 1.5x 3" across and add that in with some more screenings, for the tunnel.
1/16" stainless welding rods are nice for the opening. bend the ends over and hook together, make it oval shape and work it in.

 

[Earl Ledge]

Seems you have actually been fishing a crab trap?

 

[bigdogeh]

sounds like a crap trap to me also... have any pics?

 

[Breaking_Shimanos]

I've used some zip ties to split the entrance size in half. Will prob just redo the whole entrance doors another day but the zip ties seemed to work today. Pulled up a couple prawns today and no by catch.

Got a shaker and a couple p cod as well at 80-90 ft.

 

[reelfast]

my prawn pots didn't have doors, only ramps that were pretty narrow at the top end. never got anything but prawns in those pots.

 

[Earl Ledge]

I've used some zip ties to split the entrance size in half. Will prob just redo the whole entrance doors another day but the zip ties seemed to work today. Pulled up a couple prawns today and no by catch.

Got a shaker and a couple p cod as well at 80-90 ft.

The ramp way bottom should be flat, leading up to a circular opening about 2.5 or three inches in diameter. This circular opening is well above the floor of the trap so it is not easy to find for the prawn to escape.