Friday, November 13, 2026
It’s hard to say who was happiest at Kirk Fish Company on October 16, the second day of stone crab season. Was it the steady stream of customers leaving with bags full of stone crab claws? Or the customers lined up, anxiously waiting to get their hands on their first claws since May 1, when season closed? Perhaps it was the crabbers arriving at the Kirk’s dock on Goodland with their daily catch?
“It’s been busy like this since yesterday,” said a smiling Kelly Kirk, who runs the family business with her parents. “Since the first claws hit the dock, everyone’s been excited. It’s like kids going back to school, but it’s adults going back to stone crab season; it’s something to look forward to. That’s Marco Island. Everyone’s happy to be here. It’s a beautiful place. We’ve got the best of the best in this area, and the people that visit us are out of this world.”
Kirk said interacting with her customers is more than simple business transactions.
“Our customers are like our friends,” she said, “and we wouldn’t survive without them. We need them as much as they appreciate us. The people that visit Marco Island are just as grateful to be here as we are to have them here.”
As Daniel Doxsee backs his crab boat Endangered Species into the dock, his crew is smiling. Working as a crabber is tough, backbreaking work. But bringing in over 400 pounds of crab claws helps to ease the pain.
“It’s hard work,” Kirk acknowledges, “but the guys all have a good day. They have fun, they joke around with each other. They enjoy what they do. So it makes the hard days easier.”
The staff at Kirk’s have barely had time to catch their breath since stone crab season started. Stone crab season runs from October 15 to May 1.
The start of stone crab season has been a little different for Kirk this year. Her father, Damas, is suffering from back pain. So she is taking a more active role in processing the claws as they come off the boats.
“This way of life is not easy on a body,” she said. “And Dad spent the majority of his life on a crab boat before things were fancy and hydraulic and all that. So he took a beating at a young age and has had one big back surgery and probably needs another. But he’s going to fight it for all it’s worth. He was good up until about a week ago and did something weird. So he’s been down for the count. But it’s one of those things where I know I can do it without him, but I don’t ever want to have to. We’re a well-oiled machine here with mom and dad. And we have the support of a great team.”
Two key members of the support team are Samantha Pate and Kyle Ellington. Pate runs the retail store and Ellington, a Goodland native, runs the dock.
“We have a great group of crabbers that are willing to jump in and help with anything we need,” Kirk said. «And we›ve got Kyle; he runs the dock for us. He’s great. It’s a huge job. When we’re busy with retail or we’re busy grading stone crabs or dealing with wholesale orders, we want to make sure we have someone we’re confident can make sure things get written down and things are taken care of and clean and operational. It’s great to have a crew that sees the bigger picture with us. And Sam’s my best friend. She’s been with us since we met during our freshman year of high school. We went to college together at Florida State. We couldn’t do it without her. She does all our fish smoking. Sam can run the retail end like nobody’s business.”
Kirk said the early returns point to a good stone crab season.
“We’re only two days in,” she said, “so things can change drastically. But from what I’ve heard and what I’ve seen, the crabs I’ve handled, they look like really healthy crabs. It’s a really mixed grade. It’s not all big crabs. We’re seeing all different sizes. I don’t know if that’s necessarily better or worse. But the crabs themselves are full, big, heavy crabs. And everyone said that the water looks really good out there.”
When the water looks good for crabbing, that doesn’t mean it’s crystal clear.
“Crabs like it a little bit stirred up,” Kirk said. “Crabs like muddy water because they’re not susceptible to predation; they’re able to move freely when the water’s stirred up. If it’s crystal clear, something can eat them very easily. For us, what good water looks like is we haven’t had any massive storms. We haven’t had any red tide events that have changed or moved things around. We haven’t seen any water quality issues that would be concerning to us. We’ve heard from the blue crab fishermen, the backwater fishermen, that there’s been a lot of stone crab activity all summer long. Now they don’t harvest them, but they see them. So that’s always a good sign. The biggest thing to me is the health of the crab. When the guys tell me that the crabs look really healthy, that’s a win. That means that we’re doing something right.”
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