This month marks 20 years for the Texas Abandoned Crab Trap Removal Program, taking place Feb. 18-27. Texas coastal waters will close to crabbing with wire mesh crab traps to facilitate the annual volunteer crab trap cleanup.

Any traps left in bays — including traps tied to docks — will be assumed abandoned and considered “litter” under state law. This allows volunteers to legally remove any crab traps they find. Every year countless volunteers spend 10 days on the water searching the Texas bays and shorelines for abandoned crab traps. When left in the water, these crab traps foul shrimpers’ nets, snag anglers’ lines, “ghost fish,” and create unsightly views. To date, they’ve hauled off more than 40,000 of these derelict traps.

Lower Laguna Madre Clean-Up

Locally, the non-facilitated trap drop-off sites for the lower Laguna Madre include the Port Mansfield Navigation District Ramp in Raymondville and Adolfe Thomae County Park in Rio Hondo. The sites will have clean-up events on Feb. 19 from 8 a.m. to noon. Volunteers may focus their efforts on Feb. 19 or work at their own pace anytime during the closure. Volunteers must not remove traps prior to Feb. 18 or after Feb. 27.

To participate, volunteers may pick up free tarps, gloves and additional information at their local TPWD Coastal Fisheries field stations. TPWD requests that volunteers who remove traps record and submit information about the number of traps they collect as well as documenting any sightings of diamondback terrapins.

The Coastal Conservation Association Texas, Coastal Bend Bays & Estuaries Program, Galveston Bay Foundation, San Antonio Bay Partnership, and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service are providing continued support to the crab trap removal program. Numerous other organizations and companies also are volunteering their services.

All other legal means of crabbing will not be affected during the closure period for wire crab traps.

For more information on the local efforts, contact TPWD coordinator Jason Ferguson at 956-350-4490.