Crawfish gripped the decks of the Ellie June on Thursday as Fred Jackson and his nephew Justin Pulliam guided the boat from trap to trap off the shore of Sand Harbor, pulling up hundreds of crustaceans to sell to restaurants and casinos in Nevada.
Jackson, owner of Tahoe Lobster Co., got the permit in July to start the first commercial fishing operation in Lake Tahoe since the 1930s. A dream that started two years ago when Jackson woke up one night with the idea to catch and sell crawfish has finally become a reality.
“Everybody thought I was crazy,” Jackson said.
It's a project that benefits crawfish fans and Lake Tahoe alike, he said. Crawfish are an invasive species that have been linked to water clarity issues. As Jackson explains it, the animals are like cattle. As they graze along the lake floor, they release excrement, an aquatic form of Miracle-Gro, that causes more algae to grow and cloud the water.
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