Chapter 117: Collective Migration of Conger Eels
Liang Ziqiang’s blind guessing method cannot be said to have a high accuracy rate, but it is still somewhat effective.
I waited a little longer than usual, and estimated that the fishing net had sunk deeper underwater, then I reeled in the net again.
Pulling it back to the boat, this time the catch was slightly less than the previous one, but in terms of proportion, the majority was still saury, with silver pomfret making up a small half.
This at least shows that the approach is basically correct!
Liang Zifeng was not as accurate, but when he pulled the net in, he found about 20 kilograms of fish, with a few silver pomfret among them.
At this time, no one cared about anyone else. Li Liang, Deng Zhaocai, and Liang's father Liang Tiancheng were all afraid of missing the opportunity and cast their nets into the sea one after another.
Liang Ziqiang cast out several nets in succession, and the catch of each net decreased. When the fifth net was pulled up, there were only a few bamboo swordfish.
All three boats collected their nets, somewhat reluctantly.
Seeing that there was really nothing to catch, Liang Ziqiang put the fishing net aside and took out a "sea bass" instead.
It is said that the underwater digger is just thrown into the seabed, but in fact there are definitely some rules to follow.
The direction of the ocean current in this area is still biased to the east. When throwing the seabed dart, Liang Ziqiang let the two small iron anchors on the truss point one south and one north, while the pocket-like "big net bag" on the seabed dart was in the east-west direction, with the net mouth facing west.
In this way, when the "seabed sling" sinks to the bottom of the sea and its position is fixed, the net bag will be completely opened and straightened under the influence of the ocean current, like a butterfly net fluttering eastward.
Fish and shrimp are carried into the "big net bag" by ocean currents and become entangled inside, making it easy to get in but difficult to get out.
After releasing one, Liang Ziqiang sailed the boat a certain distance away and then released another one.
Repeat the same procedure, then the third one.
After all four were released, Li Liang and Deng Zhaocai continued to release them...
Liang Ziqiang was somewhat surprised: "How many sea slugs did you two bring here? You didn't come here to cast nets to catch fish, but to release sea slugs specifically, right?!"
Li Liang pointed at Deng Zhaocai:
"I don't have many. The main reason is that Ah Cai is such a greedy pig. My wages are not enough to satisfy his appetite. He usually helps me pull the nets like he hasn't eaten. Once he lets go, he jumps to the bottom of the sea as if he has eaten ginseng!"
Liang Ziqiang chuckled to show his understanding.
Deng Zhaocai's family didn't have a boat, this boat belonged to Li Liang, and every time he was on the boat, he was helping Li Liang. It was estimated that Li Liang paid him three yuan for helping each time.
But the two were close friends after all, so Li Liang agreed to let him bring the sea bass with him, and the income from the sea bass would be kept by each of them. In other words, Deng Zhaocai got a free ride on Li Liang's boat.
Compared to the three dollars of wages, the seabed is the biggest part, and it is obviously much more attractive than the wages...
Liang's father did not give up diving into the sea. Seeing that there was nothing to fish in this area for the time being, he took the lead in driving the boat to another place.
Liang Ziqiang followed suit, and soon Li Liang's boat caught up.
When the two ships were getting closer, Li Liang praised Liang Zifeng:
"Afeng, you've made progress! I just saw you casting a net to catch saury by yourself, and you look pretty good at it! Let me tell you something..."
Liang Zifeng glanced at him without saying a word, and turned around silently, with his back to Li Liang...
Deng Zhaocai couldn't bear to watch this, and shouted at Liang Zifeng's back:
"A Feng, you are wrong! Li Liang won't ask you to help write love letters anymore. Yuan Xiaomei is already engaged. Haven't you heard? You're still writing love letters!"
Liang Zifeng felt relieved when he heard this. He turned around and asked Li Liang happily, "What do you want to talk about?"
Li Liang saw his happy face and almost fell down on the boat out of anger:
"I wanted to remind you how to use more force to throw the net farther. Forget it!"
Li Liang said this and moved the boat a little further away. He really didn't want to bother with Liang Zifeng anymore.
The three ships continued to sail on the sea.
After a while, figures swimming in groups of three or two appeared on the sea again, but they were scattered and not in large scale.
These fish sometimes popped up from the water and sometimes sank to the bottom.
"Braid fish!"
"Yes, there are only a few doglegs here and there, so we can cast two nets!"
The braid fish is also known as the oxtail fish and the dogleg fish. It is the kind of fish that Li Liang and Deng Zhaocai snatched from Lin Guangming last time and beat up Lin Guangming and Lin Guangqi.
Dogleg fish like to live in sandy bottom sea areas, sometimes cruising in the middle and lower layers, and sometimes floating up for a while.
This fish, like goby, is a cheap fish and cannot be sold at a high price, but it is cheaper than saury anyway.
Another characteristic of this fish is that they don’t usually form large schools. Just like right now, these dogleg fish are swimming up and down, swimming individually, but they haven’t formed a large-scale school of fish.
But Liang Ziqiang and his friends had nothing to complain about. If they were to be picky, they would not be able to see any fish at sea after November. By then, they would be happy if they could encounter a small group of dogleg fish.
The three boats each began casting their nets, chasing after the scattered doglegs.
Because the fish were so scattered, each net only held about seven or eight kilograms.
The advantage is that because they are scattered, they will not panic like dense schools of fish and quickly flee when faced with fishing.
So, the three boats cast a net here and there, and gradually each boat cast more than ten nets.
Liang Ziqiang kept casting and pulling the nets, mechanically repeating the same actions, and his arms and shoulders were a little sore. He had clearly rested at home for four days, but these dozen or so nets of sporadic braided fish made it seem like he had not rested at all.
The two brothers glanced at the deck. As the saying goes, a little bit of accumulation makes a lot. Adding up, the dogleg fish on the deck probably weighed about 80 to 90 kilograms.
After a busy morning, it's time for lunch again.
Liang Ziqiang cooked some rice in a rice cooker, heated up the shrimp dumplings his wife had given him, and then picked out two fish to cook and eat.
Silver pomfret can be sold for 60 cents, so I definitely wouldn't want to eat it. Saury is only a little over 1 cent, and dog leg fish is even cheaper, not more than 1 cent. So I picked one each of the saury and dog leg fish to eat as dishes.
If Chen Xiangbei were here, she would fry the saury and it would be very tasty. Liang Ziqiang's cooking was edible, but not delicious.
After filling our stomachs, we continued to look for new targets. It was already afternoon. The three boats had sailed south for a while and had begun to discuss returning.
We have not yet exceeded the safe fishing area, so we can continue to sail far south. The reason for the discussion of returning is not because of the depth of the sea, but because the silver pomfret caught in the morning is quite special.
Silver pomfret is very different from golden pomfret. Golden pomfret can still survive on the boat for a while after being caught, but silver pomfret has a characteristic that it basically dies as soon as it leaves the water.
It is now past noon and the silver carp has been on the boat for half a day. Even though the temperature is much lower than the previous two months and the continuous rainfall has made the weather significantly cooler, it is still not advisable to store it for too long without buying ice cubes on board, and it has to be sold as soon as possible.
The three boats did not return by the same route, but instead deviated slightly, hoping to take a different route and pick up one or two more fish along the way.
At this time, almost all six people discovered at the same time that from time to time one or two pointed and thin heads popped out of the water, and on the side of the boat, there were slender and smooth figures swimming by twisting and turning.
"No way, where did all these snakes come from?"
Liang Zifeng looked at it from a distance and said with some fear.
Liang Ziqiang looked carefully at those slender figures, and his face was filled with joy: "Where did the snakes come from? These are conger eels migrating en masse, swimming to deep water areas! I didn't expect to run into conger eels migrating on the way back, this is a good thing!"
The fishing nets were ready again, and they caught up with the conger eels swimming southward and cast them down...
(End of this chapter)
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