They can, however be tar spotted occasionally. This is actually the crayfish equivilant of rape, apparently, happens when a big red buck pins a white inside a pot, according the fisheries' researchers opinion. And this is how you will sometimes get the big red bucks inside a pot of whites, they are out for a good time. 

I see a lot of questions about " whites" on here, and what it means. if you were wondering, read on.

The white phase is a once-off in the lifecycle of the western rock lobster, they only do it once, around the time of their first maturity. I know the size of whites can vary a bit, from those annoying " just under " cackers to the big milk bottles, but this is really just a carapace range of about 7mm, which can be explained by different growth rates and individual variations in vigor. Their " walking" is their first major migration, governed by density and conditions at the time--they are just looking for food and shelter enough, away from the congestion of the inshore reef and all the other animals. Some just stay behind, you will see them slowly turning darker, until they go full red at the next moult. Some will travel vast distances -- after hitting the deep water on the edge of the shelf they will ride the currents , usually north, then fan out inshore looking for somewhere to live. Exactly how they decide to come further back in is very hard to gauge. I say " usually" north, but in years of very high density around the Perth area, they will turn south, and this is when you get the truly epic southern runs, and repopulation of your inshore areas down toward the Cape.  In the northern end of the fishery, they will go over the edge south of the Abrolhos, and ride the southerly tides way up--one year, the most diehard of the boats chasing them got almost to Exmouth. Catches were huge,mortality rates were high, the catch was dying in the tanks. I had a great run later that year off South Passasge, catching the ones that had peeled off and come in along the way. The best catches occur when the boats are on the migrating mass and the tide turns and comes from the north, it slows them right up and they feed. We are talking depths of 70-100 fathoms, or sometimes more.

Do you know that boats were very recently pulling big catches of whites north of Kalbarri? They apparently first turned up about 60 miles north, then spread further south. They were definitely whites, they had the worn-down tails and legs that these crays get, very distinctive. Catches were patchy, you were on them or not,and those crays had been travelling since January. Personally, I would put it down to the fact that the Big Bank area, north of the Abrolhos area, has been closed to fishing for years now as part of the breeding stock conservation effort, and it is now utterly choked with crays, and these ones had nowhere else to go, just kept wandering. I've seen this on a smaller scale, late March, catching them outside everyone else on the very patchy  ground north west of Kalbarri. Kept quiet about it, then a few days later the blokes further inside on the easier to work ground started picking them up. They were moving east, coming in from the deep water.