Rasita

I Remember When - I would go yabbying

When I was a kid and we lived in a semi rural area, I would often go yabbying with friends. There was a creek that ran along the back of our place, which was eventually replaced with an open stormwater drain. The small creek eventually ran all the way down to a large saltwater creek lined with paperbarks and mangroves.
We sometimes tried the traditional method of yabbying by tying a piece of meat to a string, but more often then not, we would just scoop around in the small pools with our home made nets and sort through what we brought out.
We quickly learnt how to pick up the crays and not get nipped by their fearsome nippers, which way they would try to swim away(they swam backwards) and which were best put back as they were too small to eat.
We would cook them in salted water, to help get rid of the muddy taste, until their shells went red. The bigger they were the more meat you found in the nippers.
When I was older we tried to keep yabbies as pets but they kept escaping and finding secretive spots to die and smell funny which attracted flies.