Learn

What We Do

The Outer Banks Seafood Festival provides the opportunity to learn more about our local fishing industry and heritage. Come and watch live demonstrations, meet the fisher folk and see the boats involved in bringing fresh seafood to your table. Celebrate our rich, seafood heritage and discover what it has done for our local community.

View all of the scheduled talks and demos in the Education tent in the Fishing Village on our Event Schedule page.
Event Schedule

Education

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The Boats

There will be a variety of boats on display during the Festival. We encourage you to walk around and get a close up view of some of the hardworking vessels that bring fresh North Carolina Seafood to your table.

Bow Picker
Bowpickers or “muzzle loaders” are specifically designed for gillnet fishing.
Crab Boat
Crab boats are specially designed for crabbing and the unique challenges associated with working and living at sea.
Dory Boat
A Dory boat is a flat-bottomed rowboat with high, flaring sides and two pointed (or nearly pointed) ends.
Gillnet Stand
Gillnets hang like vertical walls in the water and capture fish by the gills as they try to swim through the mesh of the net.
Pound Net Set
A system of nets staked upright in the water and a rectangular enclosure or pound, from which escape is impossible.
Shad Boat
Shad boats are the official state boats of North Carolina, first developed around Roanoke Island after the Civil War.
Shrimp Boat
Shrimp boats, sometimes called shrimping boats or shrimpers, are boats rigged especially to catch shrimp as part of the shrimp fishery.