Recently, a strange scene occurred in Wanning Dong'ao, Hainan, where flocks of crabs gathered on the surface of the water, and the resources were extremely rich, making onlookers directly addicted! The size of these crabs is about 3 to 6 centimeters, which is particularly eye-catching under the illumination of the lights, so that a spectacular "crab sea" is formed. How many crabs are there? Just pick up the net and copy it, hundreds of crabs will all be "caught" in tens of seconds, and a cabin can be fished in ten minutes!
Every year in September, when the crab is at its fattest, the female crab is full of cream and nutrients, and it is a rare and delicious seafood. So, what species of crab is in the video? Can I eat it? Does the emergence of the "Crab Sea" mean that fishing can be liberalized? Today we will discuss these issues well.
According to experts who study crabs, the crabs that appear in the video are word-patterned bow crabs, which belong to the bow crab genus of the bow crab family, and some areas are also called rice crabs and crabs, which are relatively common. Although this crab is small, it is also quite a lot of oil when it is the fattest in the autumn every year, and it is often cooked into a variety of authentic snacks, which is very popular with the public.
In China, the bow crab is mainly distributed in the southeast coast, and is more common in the coastal waters of Hainan, Guangdong and other places. Especially at the mouth of the river, the organic matter content is rich, which provides a rich bait for the growth and development of marine organisms, and is an important place for the fattening of fish, shrimp and crabs.
Every year from August to September, the estuary area is prone to outbreaks of "crab sea", and there have been many reports before. For example, in August last year, an unknown small crab (later confirmed to be a bow crab with a word pattern) "occupied" the sea around Xiaoshan in Zhejiang Province, gathering in groups on the water and snorkeling up and down, attracting local residents to go out collectively and fish for special fishing. It can be seen at the scene that the fishing equipment carried by the masses is very simple, the "three-piece set" of hand lamps, nets and plastic barrels is enough, and it can be fished for a few pounds in 30 minutes, and more than a hundred pounds can be fished, and it is full of several large basins.
Subsequently, these crabs are taken home by residents, or cooked by themselves, or taken to restaurants for processing, and there are various ways to eat them, braised, steamed, fried, fried, stir-fried, and everything can be done. In Chaoshan, Guangdong, there are also many people who directly marinate this crab into "crab", and the spices used are garlic, red pepper, shaojiu, soy sauce, peppercorns, etc., which are eaten raw after being pickled into the flavor, which is a unique local food custom.
It should be reminded that the bow crab is very adaptable to salinity and can also prosper at the freshwater sewage outlet. If the water quality is polluted, then the body of the bow crab is easy to enrich toxic substances such as heavy metals, and the number of parasites is also large, and it is not recommended to eat frequently and in large quantities, especially raw food.
The place where the "Crab Sea" appeared was in Wanning Dong'ao, located in the southeast of Hainan Island, and naturally belonged to the South China Sea in terms of sea division. The phenomenon of "crab sea" shows that the crustacean resources near the coast of the South China Sea have been restored to a certain extent, which is related to the moderate ban on fishing. Because the bow crab is not a protected animal, it is widely distributed and abundant in number, and there is no existential crisis, so it can be used in moderation.
However, it should be noted that crustaceans such as crabs have a shorter reproductive cycle, high spawning, rapid generational renewal, and can quickly prosper in the short term, and the effect of fishing ban is more obvious. As for marine fish that mature for 2 to 4 years, the effect of the ban on fishing is lackluster. Therefore, the emergence of the "crab sea" is not representative, does not mean that the fishery resources have been "flooded", and does not mean that the fishing ban system can be left behind.
How many fish are left in the south China Sea today? To understand the real situation of fisheries in the South China Sea, we can start with the actual fishing situation of local fishermen.
According to the dynamic information of fishing in the South China Sea, from 2015 to 2019, there were 6 important catches in the northern part of the South China Sea, including striped fish, blue round mane, snake mullet and so on. However, since 2017, the proportion of these catches has declined, 16.33 percentage points less in 2019 than in 2016, especially the striped fish, which is one of the "four sea products", the decline is even more obvious, and the amount of resources has reached a worrying point.
2017 was a bumper harvest year for fish in the South China Sea, when fishermen from the three major provinces and regions caught enough oil in the South China Sea, and 12.37% of the catch was brought fish. However, in the following years, the share of striped fish fell significantly, falling to 6.28% in 2018 and further to 1.75% in 2019 (see table below). Some experts have assessed that at present, the fishing resources in the South China Sea have been "unable to make ends meet", and the status of population resources is worrying, and it will be difficult to recover to the average level of previous years in the next few years.
Chart of changes in catch rates of fish in the South China Sea from 2015 to 2019
The downturn with fish is not unique. The squid, which is also one of the "four sea products", is in a similar situation to that of the fish, and it is difficult to hide the decline. Under the scavenging of fishing boats day and night, it has become a fact that economic fish have decreased and small trash fish have "ascended". In order to obtain more benefits, fishermen are "forced" to continuously increase the horsepower of fishing boats and increase the number of fishing gear, which seems to be a matter of course, but in fact, it intensifies disorderly and vicious competition.
Judging from the 2020 Fishery Statistics Yearbook, the fish resources in the other three major seas in China are also declining at the same time, and the catch continues to decrease. In 2019, the catch in the four sea areas each decreased by 90,000 to 160,000 tons, and the largest decrease was in the Bohai Sea, reaching 20%. This year, the Bohai Sea reduced its fishery production by 160,000 tons, which is equivalent to the total catch of 7 ChaoHu lakes!
At 12:00 on August 16, 2021, the fishing moratorium in the South China Sea officially ended, and tens of thousands of fishing boats from three provinces and regions, including Hainan, Guangdong and Guangxi, went out to sea to fish. Prior to this, the South China Sea had experienced a three-and-a-half-month fishing ban, from May 1 to August 16.
Compared with the ten-year fishing ban on the Yangtze River, the intensity of the fishing ban in the South China Sea is minimal, and it is difficult to achieve the desired effect. If we want to restore resources by a large margin, a short-term fishing ban may be difficult to meet.
The ban on fishing in the South China Sea has been tried every year, but the amount of fish resources has not been restored, what is the problem? Could it be that the ban on fishing has no effect?
As we all know, 3.5 months can only barely provide a window period for fish to reproduce, and it is impossible to guarantee the development of juvenile fish to the adult stage. After the end of the fishing ban period, a large number of fishing boats go out to sea to fish, and the phenomenon of overfishing and misattaught (harming innocents) is inevitable. At that time, a large number of juvenile fish will be exhausted, but the juvenile fish are not the target catch of fishermen, and are often directly abandoned, resulting in waste of resources and exacerbating marine pollution, resulting in the failure to consolidate the results of the ban.
Some people may ask, since the short-term fishing ban has had little effect, why does the South China Sea not implement a ten-year fishing ban like the Yangtze River Basin?
There are many factors to take into account in this issue, the most important of which is the employment of fishermen. As we all know, going out to sea to fish is the main source of income for fishermen, and if fishermen's employment and career change cannot be properly settled in advance, then a long-term ban on fishing cannot be discussed. Relevant data show that in 2019, the average per capita net income of fishermen in the country was only 21,000 yuan, the cultural quality of practitioners was generally low, many fishermen would only fish, no other skills, and it was not easy to find another suitable job.
According to statistics, China's current fishery population is 18 million people. Since January 1, 2020, the ten-year ban on fishing on the Yangtze River has led to the idleness of 110,000 fishing boats along the Yangtze River, and the collective landing of 280,000 fishermen, resulting in serious loss of fishery population. The 280,000 fishermen are a fairly large group of job placements, and the difficulty of changing jobs and production can be imagined.
Hainan fishing vessel dynamic information
So, how many fishermen are there in the South China Sea? According to the 2020 survey, there are 244,000 traditional fishermen in Guangdong Province, 65,000 in Guangxi, and 118,000 in Hainan, for a total of 427,000 in these three provinces! Therefore, there are half as many traditional fishermen in the South China Sea area as fishermen in the Yangtze River, and the pressure to change production is even greater, and it is not realistic to ban fishing for a long time.
The phenomenon of "crab sea" in Wanning, Hainan, does not mean that China's fishery resources have "returned to the peak". For small seafood such as the bow crab, there is nothing wrong with proper fishing and eating, but for traditional fishermen, there is still a lot of pressure to really hold the "cornucopia" of the South China Sea fishery.
Since it is difficult to achieve a ten-year ban on fishing in the waters of the South China Sea, it is advisable to make a fuss about fishing methods, and we can boldly rationally allocate the catch and fishing species of fishermen to avoid the recurrence of indiscriminate fishing in the form of restricting quotas. I believe that with the continuous deepening of research, China's quota system can finally be implemented and truly benefit future generations!