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8. SPIDERS AND PROCESSING CRAYS.
And the spiders were given away!
There have always been many varieties of scale fish in Lacepede Bay and these have mostly been sought after by the amatuer fishers. Lobsters, or crayfish as they were originally called, have always been the main commercial catch. Although they are now considered to be a luxury by many people at times they have been hard to sell.
In the 1940's a small business started in the town to market the raw (or green) tails. As soon as the boats came in the tails would be removed from the freshly caught crayfish and then packed in boxes according to weight and frozen for export.
The bodies or "spiders", as they were known, were then cooked in a household copper. Later that day or next morning when they had cooled employees came in and picked the meat from the bodies and legs which was then packaged for sale. At times the surplus cooked spiders were sold by the bag full or given away to local clubs and organisations to be used for a special supper or tea. This business closed in about 1960 when different markets were available overseas, mainly in the United States of America.
Info courtesy Kingston branch of the National Trust.
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