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Q: What is your favourite prank you've pulled while on the boat?
A: I think the best one so far was painting prison stripes on Matt's rain gear, that was basically right in front of him.
Q: What was the worst mistake you've made while on the boat, and what did you learn from it?
A: There are so many, that's how you learn. Not to be too much of a cowboy and try to do everything yourself. Because if you do, you're just going to burn out and fade away. We're not supermen, we need to remember that. A bad one, for example, I forgot to turn on my fuel pump to fill my day tank with fuel, therefore killing the engine. It got fixed in a hurry, but it was just a brain fart.
Q: What are the things that make you really angry at sea?
A: People that don't listen, or you have to tell somebody four times, or show somebody four times, how to do something. And when we're not catching crab. You just have to grin and bear it! Keep a positive attitude.
Q: How do you keep a positive attitude about everything when out to sea?
A: You have to keep a positive attitude, no matter what happens. Your mother's not there to go run and cry to, so you have to pretty much deal with everything on your own. You have to be able to laugh about everything. If you're going to sit there in a slump, you probably won't get your work done.
Q: Do you ever get seasick? How do you handle the big waves?
A: Yeah, I get sick. Every time we leave port I get seasick. I used to try pills, powders, and drugs and nothing really worked. So, you just need to muddle through, grin and bear it, and take it like a man for a few days. Until you've thrown up as long as you can, and then you get to work. Or you work while you're puking.
Q: How do you keep from getting hypothermia?
A: Work. Keep moving. If you are cold, you are not working hard enough. I say it to the guys who say "it's cold out here". Well, start moving, do something. Plus, you wear layers of clothes. You have to wear the right clothes of course. We wear nothing but Harry Hansen gear, which probably saves our butts.
Q: Is there more then just your main engine on your boat, if that goes down, do you have any back up?
A: There's just the one. So we need to treat it like it's our own baby.
Q: As an engineer, what was the hardest thing you had to fix on the Northwestern at sea?
A: When you're in a pinch, hydraulics are probably the worst ones to pinpoint. When you lose power, it's the art of deduction. We've lost crab pumps, too, and that's no small chore to fix. It's the pumps that keep water flowing to the tanks. If we lose one of those, it's a pretty big chore. We bring the boat down every year to repair, and hopefully for preventative maintenance. That's why we've never had major breakdowns at sea.
Q: Is there a difference between opilio and king crab fishing grounds?
A: There is. Opilio crab are much deeper and farther up to the north west. King crab are much shallower and farther to the east, in the Bering Sea.
Q: How are spots picked? Water temperature, mating times or mating areas?
A: As far as fishing, they do do a survey four months prior to a crab season and that gives you a general idea of where an abundance of crab is. But within four months, those crab are usually long gone, so you just need to go by feel or you go by your old records. And you just put them in the water and go from there. Unless you're lucky enough to get information from Blake. Just talk to Blake, he'll tell you! Mating areas? If you're on a school with male and female mix, then you want to get off that school and get on one with bigger male crabs. It really doesn't matter, as long as there's crab at the bottom.
Q: How do you determine the weight of the crab to get your total?
A: If it's king crab, we do have a scale on board, and we throw maybe 50 crab in a tote an d then we weigh all the crab at once. That way we get a good average for the weight. For opilio crab, we can pretty much judge those by the eye. They're usually 1.5lbs on average, down to 1.3lb. We can see if we're on the good size of average. But knowing your boat helps too. We can measure our tank and we basically know exactly how much crab is in there by the foot. That's how well we know our boat.
Q: We only see great catches, have you ever had a very poor season?
A: I personally have fished for a month and a half, and I didn't even make enough for my airfare. This was years ago. So, every dog has his day, you have to take the ups with the downs.
Q: What do you think is the most important superstition to heed while at sea?
A: Do not talk about the weather. If it's actually a nice day and you mention the fact it's a nice day, it's not going to be a nice day any more.
Q: They never show you guys eating, when do you get a chance to grab a bite to eat and get some coffee?
A: The coffee is pouring in 24 hours a day. So, we're running in and out getting our cups full. As far as food, we do usually get a chance for one meal a day, a sit down meal, that's usually dinner before we go to bed. There are times where we'll get a lunch in there somewhere. Ninety per cent of the time it's fend for yourself.
Q: Who cooks for you, and what is your favourite comfort meal?
A: I used to cook for seven or eight years, until I became engineer. Now Matt is our cook. And a favourite meal would be steak and shrimp, because that's usually our going-in meal. That's our meal when we're on our way to town.
