Boil for about 20 minutes. Crab sex Check your state regulations to determine legal size and open waters About Crabs May and June are the most common months in which mating occurs, though it can occur at other times of the year. The female stores the sperm in a seminal receptacle until the fall when the eggs are fertilized. She cannot molt in the fall when the male does because she loses the sperm receptacle at that time. When the fertilized eggs are extruded, the resulting mass, often called the sponge, is attached to the female.
Females carrying eggs usually bury themselves in sandy beaches during the fall.
Please leave these females alone when you run across them while digging clams. The embryos develop during the winter and the eggs darken to a dark brown. Between January and March, the larval crabs hatch and swim freely in the sea. They do not resemble adult crabs at this time, and must molt repeatedly and grow much larger before they are recognizable as crabs. When they reach a quarter of an inch in size, approximately one year after the mating that produced them, the juveniles finally resemble the adults they will become.