Tag Archives: shrimping
Coastal Georgia Shrimping: A new season of uncertainty, possibilities and hope
In a word, “difficult,” said Dee Kicklighter of their most recent shrimping season. Kicklighter, who has worked with Mathews for about eight years, has seen first-hand how the unpredictability of the business can be costly. “You plan for something to be one price, and then the next week you come back, and it could be potentially thousands of dollars more, depending on what you’re dealing with,” he said of fluctuating prices, including fuel. Over the years, Mathews said the ever-changing cost of fuel has taken a toll on the number of shrimpers in the industry. It’s not just Georgia shrimpers contending with the negative effects from imports. North Carolina, Texas, Louisiana, Florida and other coastal states are also feeling the friction of narrowing profit margins that threaten their way of life. Photos, more, >>click to read<< 09:15
Shrimping: an endangered tradition
The salty ocean air, the smell of pluff mud, seafood restaurants line the streets, yet shrimp boats sit docked at the harbor. This is the scene pictured in the future by local shrimper and president of South Carolina’s Shrimpers Association, Rocky Magwood, as a result of imported shrimp. Shrimping has long been a tradition and staple of the local Charleston industry, with generations of shrimpers selling their product locally and beyond. A proud heritage and position for many shrimpers. However, as a result of increasingly high levels of imported shrimp, local shrimping jobs are at risk, according to Rocky Magwood. “The p rice of shrimp is terrible,” Magwood said. “Most shrimpers are broke right now.” photos, more, >>click to read<< 06:32
David Rainer: Plash has ‘Gotta Go’ shrimping despite low prices
Doug Plash really can’t help himself, but you can blame it all on his roots. When he’s sitting at home on Plash Island on the banks of the Bon Secour River, the urge to head out in his boat and harvest the tasty crustaceans that are plentiful along Alabama’s Gulf Coast is overwhelming. “There’s a boat across the river named ‘I Gotta Go,’” Plash said in the wheelhouse of his shrimp boat named after his daughters, Melissa, Jennifer and Kristi. “I probably should have named my boat that.” Plash Island came into existence when the Intracoastal Canal was dug in the 1940s, separating the land that is surrounded by the Bon Secour River on the other sides. He is the fifth generation of Plashes to live on the island with his grandfathers buried on the island. One grandfather owned a freight company that used five schooners to haul beer from the Jax Brewery in New Orleans and hauled freight to Mobile. The semi-truck eventually left the schooners at the dock. photos, more, >>click to read<< 13:15
Wild-Caught Shrimp: South Carolina’s Long History
There’s something positively serene about watching shrimp boats trawling our coastal waters. Shrimping has been an important part of our culture in Beaufort and all of South Carolina since long before anyone can remember. In fact it’s been a labor of love for fishermen since before the Civil War and is still alive and kicking today with a thriving market served by dedicated commercial fishermen in the Palmetto State. Shrimp are America’s most valuable and most popular seafood, according to the NOAA Fisheries, and SCDNR tells us that South Carolina is home to three species of shrimp: brown shrimp, white shrimp, and pink shrimp. Brown and white shrimp are more common than pink shrimp, but all three taste the same. >>click to read<< 20:47
Shrimpin’ Ain’t Easy
Miss Marilyn Louise, a third-generation commercial fisherwoman, is one of the largest contributors to the seafood supply chain coming through Mayport Inlet. The lifelong resident of Mayport Fishing Village walked me through what it’s like to live a life sustained by the ocean. As a child, Miss Marilyn learned to run shrimp boats from her father and grandfather. She’s since passed her knowledge and experience on to her own children, having taken her son out shrimping with her when he was only 11 days old, noting he had sea legs before he could walk on land. >click to read< 07:56
Along Georgia’s coast, shrimping remains an important industry
Shrimpers are known to be the heart of McIntosh County. However, they face significant challenges leading some to wonder if the industry will survive. “There’s a lot of work that goes into it, and long hours, at times, that goes into it,” Robert Todd said. It’s 4 a.m., as the Sundown and its crew leave the Wait-N-Sea dock in Townsend. “On our vessel right now, there’s three of us on the back deck.,, Todd and McKinzie say it’s a dwindling industry and look toward the younger generation to keep it afloat. “We don’t see the State of Georgia pushing commercial fishermen. This is still a trade. It is a complicated trade because you don’t learn how to commercial fish in a classroom,” >click to read< 16:26
There’s something in the water: Shrimp!
Back in the 1990s, watermen started noticing shrimp were getting caught in their gill nets in waters just off Virginia Beach. Virginia Marine Resources Commission in 2018 issued free shrimp permits to a couple of watermen in Virginia Beach who would haul in 300 pounds of shrimp on a good day. Today, 12 watermen, with permits, work the waters for shrimp and on a good day, the haul is more than a thousand pounds. 100 people applied for 2020 permits but only 12 permits were issued to watermen in Virginia Beach and the Eastern Shore in a lottery system. Shrimping is also a game of chance. “One day I think I caught 16 shrimp, two days later [I caught] 1700 pounds,” >video, click to read< 07:34
Sam “Sammy” Lee Liverman, Jr. of Colington, October 28
Sam “Sammy” L. Liverman, Jr. has gone to be with the Lord. He transitioned peacefully from his earthly life in Greenville, NC Monday October 28, 2019. Sammy was born April 18, 1968- the son of Sam and Virginia Liverman, of Colington, NC. Sammy was a proud waterman- fishing, crabbing, and shrimping out of Colington nearly his whole life. In addition to commercial fishing, Sammy was employed with NC DOT for several years as a professional equipment operator.,, Sammy will be remembered by all who knew and loved him. >click to read< 15:32
What’s the future of Port Royal’s waterfront? Here’s what the town is considering
The town of Port Royal was set to welcome a new kind of marine vessel to its waterfront Thursday afternoon. A Maxi 72 racing sailboat will dock in Battery Creek, with its long fixed keel requiring water depth not possible many places on the East Coast. Its arrival is meant to show off the possibilities of the deep channel and introduce other possible uses for the waterfront as town leaders mull whether charter fishing boats, ferries and sails will eventually join or replace some of the iconic shrimp boats that mark one of South Carolina’s last remaining working waterfronts. Increased competition from imported shrimp and an unwillingness of a younger generation to take up shrimping are commonly blamed for the industry’s decline. >click to read<13:02
Speaking of America: ‘Here, you have the freedom’
When the communists came to his Vietnam town, fled to a fishing boat, jammed already with 50 of his wife’s family. As they cast off, they saw a barge filled with refugees sink, “and I saw a couple hundred people die in the water.,, Forty-two years later, he is a man content to see his sons and daughters make their own way as citizens here, even if they do not follow their father back to the sea. He made it here, he says, through exhausting days and nights, pulling shrimp aboard his trawler at sea for a week until the hold was full, and returning to port only long enough to unload and set out again. >click here to read< 10:23
“I’ve been commercial fishing since I was a kid,” – Pass Christian man says tonging, fishing, shrimping a family tradition
Work doesn’t really feel like work for Adam Toler, for he spends six days a week surrounded by the Mississippi Sound. He and his small crew leave the Pass Christian Harbor around sunrise each morning and return in the early afternoon with sacks of oysters to sell to seafood dealers as soon as they hit the harbor launch again. The South Mississippi seafood industry is a tradition for Toler’s family. Read the rest here 13:41