It usually takes about 30 days after the blue crabs come out of the mud from their winter hibernation for them to start shedding their shells. In Georgia, the crabs have been crawling since mid-February, and they had a run of peelers in mid-March.
In our area, the crabs have been crawling consistently for about two weeks. This suggests that we might begin to see a few peelers in southern North Carolina by the third week of April. Thus, not this week, but potentially by the end of next week, we should start to see a few. They will be small at first, hotels and primes, with the jumbos following just a few days later.
4/10/2023
