"Brother Chen, you guys help me push this manta ray out, and while you're at it, cut off its tail. The rest is up to me and Ah Hai!"
Bai Yu glanced at the stingray blocking the fish unloading port and shouted to Brother Chen beside him.
Brother Chen is the leader of this group of crew members on deck, and he is a junior leader in their company. As for Brother Huang and the others from before, they have all been promoted and received raises on the new ship.
"Alright, Mr. Bai, this manta ray is quite fierce. Even if you cut off its tail, its fighting power should not be underestimated. You and Mr. Wang need to be careful."
"Don't worry, I have some experience in catching stingrays. Let's have an extra meal tonight. I'll ask Uncle Zhang to make some braised stingray for us to try."
Bai Yu had already made arrangements for the stingray on the fish's mouth: it would be braised.
How should we describe this creature, manta ray? Despite having "devil" in its name, its scientific name is actually *Manta ray*, a large deep-sea fish.
The reason it was caught by Bai Yu and his crew this time is probably because this guy came out to forage, encountered this group of fish, and got caught in the trawl net while feeding.
Also, don't let its strange appearance fool you; it looks like a giant flying carpet and has a long, fish-tail-like appendage.
Actually, this guy's meat is very delicious, with plenty of meat and no bones. It also has a pretty good price in the market, usually over several tens of yuan per kilogram, and occasionally it can even reach one or two hundred yuan or several hundred yuan per kilogram.
The price of manta rays is very unstable, mainly depending on the region, season, and catch volume, and the fluctuation range is also very large.
It is worth mentioning that there are many species of manta rays, roughly divided into 13 species, some of which are internationally endangered protected animals.
As for the reasons for this vulnerability?
What else could it be? Being eaten by humans, of course. Once a manta ray reaches adulthood, it can grow to a huge size, sometimes weighing over a thousand pounds. If you catch one, it can fetch a very high price.
Driven by the desire for food and money, the number of manta rays is naturally decreasing, and it is normal for them to be eaten and protected.
As for the manta ray that Bai Yu and his team caught, Bai Yu wasn't quite sure which type it was, but he was certain that it definitely didn't belong to the three types: spiny manta ray, ocean manta ray, or coral manta ray.
The above three species are vulnerable and endangered manta rays, and are protected animals.
There are so many kinds of stingrays that if you ask Bai Yu to remember the characteristics of all the stingray species, he definitely won't be able to. But if you ask him to remember which kinds of stingrays are inedible, he can remember that.
After Bai Yu finished speaking, Brother Chen and another crew member also brought over a shovel, then shoveled it onto the manta ray and started pushing it.
Don't let its size fool you; this manta ray is nearly two meters wide and weighs at least 100 pounds.
But once it landed on the deck, it was a lamb to the slaughter, with no means of resistance, and could only be manipulated by Brother Chen and another crew member.
With a push of their shovels, the two men cleared the manta ray, exposing the unloading port again. The shrimp that were being hauled out of the trawl net could then easily pass through the unloading port into the hold.
As for the manta ray, after it was pushed aside, Brother Chen took a machete and chopped at its tail.
The most dangerous part of the manta ray is its tail, which has barbs and is poisonous; it's said that the venom is so potent it can kill a person.
Why is it said that...?
Nonsense, Bai Yu has never seen anyone die from being poisoned by a stinger's tail. If he hasn't seen it, he's just heard about it.
As for the machete, it's quite normal for a large fishing boat to have a machete on the deck for processing fish, since many large fish need to have their fins and other parts removed when they are caught.
With one swift stroke, Brother Chen chopped off the manta ray's tail. The stingray, in pain, trembled violently, like a wave.
Looking at this soft, boneless manta ray in front of me, no wonder people say it has a lot of meat and few bones. Judging from the way this guy's body is shaking, it doesn't look like it has bones that can shake like that.
As for the fish tail that had been cut off, Brother Chen simply took a shovel, scooped it up, and threw it into the sea.
What? You're saying that if you process the fish tail, you can get a lot of meat from it?
They didn't care; Bai Yu and the others didn't even look at the little bit of fish meat on the fish's tail.
After all, apart from the tail, the entire manta ray was on their boat. This thing weighed at least 100 pounds. All the people on their boat were together, totaling 42 people.
This one manta ray is more than enough for all of them to eat, so why bother with a fish tail?
As for why they didn't transport the stingray back to the dock and sell it?
There's no need for that. Bai Yu and his crew don't need this stingray to make money. Even if the stingray is valuable, their crew can eat it.
What's more, they just drove away a Filipino fishing boat today, pushing it out of the prawn swarm's range, which is something to celebrate.
After Brother Chen threw away the fish tail, Bai Yu also took a wooden stick and approached the manta ray. Then, he swung the stick forcefully and smashed it on the manta ray's head, sending it directly to paradise.
The rest was much easier. The motionless stingray was taken to the kitchen and handed over to Uncle Zhang to handle.
They also brought over a basket of shrimp for Uncle Zhang, asking him to process them as well, so they could have these two kinds of seafood as an extra meal for lunch today.
After taking these things into the kitchen, Bai Yu and Wang Hai didn't rest. Instead, they each took a basket and went back to the deck to clean up the shrimp scattered on it.
To be honest, the manta ray they caught earlier caused them a lot of work, so much so that they had to use shovels to clean the fish off the deck.
What? Aren't you afraid the shovel will smash the prawns to pieces?
Don't worry, because there are two types of shovels used on fishing boats: one is made of iron, and the other is made of plastic.
Bai Yu wasn't stupid. When they were shoveling these shrimp, they must have been using plastic shovels. This would improve their efficiency and not damage the appearance of the shrimp.
This busy work lasted for two and a half hours, from nine in the morning until eleven-thirty. The two brothers were so tired that they could barely straighten their backs.
Lu Sheng called him around 9 a.m. At that time, there was only one fishing boat fishing for shrimp in this area. Two and a half hours later, there were four fishing boats in this area.
Moreover, all four fishing boats have the characters "Yu Xue" (渔雪) in their names, indicating that they belong to the same company.
The three newly arrived fishing boats are Yuxue No. 2, No. 3, No. 6 and No. 7.
The remaining three fishing boats, Yuxue and Yuxue squid fishing boat, did not come here to join the fun because of the distance.
But that didn't matter. With four fishing boats, they now had the means to hunt these giant prawns. They were determined to devour the entire prawn colony.
After all, South China Sea prawns are a very high-end seafood, and they can sell for hundreds of yuan per kilogram, whether online or offline.
Moreover, the supply is still insufficient to meet the demand. As long as they can bring all these giant prawns back to the company, one ton is worth 200,000 yuan, ten tons is worth 2 million yuan, and one hundred tons is worth 20 million yuan!
According to the information detected by the fish finder, the prawn swarm they have discovered is very large, with the largest reaching a diameter of five nautical miles, and the density is also very high.
According to my uncle's estimate, this prawn colony may contain more than a million catties of prawns!
What does a million jin mean? Ten thousand jin equals five tons, so a million jin is five hundred tons. One hundred tons equals twenty million, so five hundred tons is one hundred million.
After calculating the potential value of this prawn swarm, the eyes of the eldest uncle and the captains of the other three fishing boats lit up with greed, ready to fight the prawn swarm to the death!
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