About twenty nautical miles ahead of the fishing boat Yuxue, at a depth of about fifty meters below the surface, two groups of marine life were rushing toward the fishing boat, one after the other.
These two creatures, one in front and one behind, were not living in peace; rather, the one in front was being hunted down by the one behind.
The school of fish behind was naturally the large ribbonfish that Bai Yu had found through Tongzi Ge's search, while the creature being chased by the ribbonfish in front was...
It was a large group of prawns, and a very chaotic group of seafood at that, including both king prawns and tiger prawns.
There are several varieties of prawns and tiger prawns. Prawns are divided into those with long whiskers and those with short whiskers, while tiger prawns are divided into nine-spined prawns and black tiger prawns.
Most importantly, it's not just the ribbonfish behind them that want to eat these shrimp; the shrimp themselves are also in turmoil, preying on each other. If any individual shrimp makes a mistake, the others will swarm in and devour it.
Especially the black tiger prawn, which, taking advantage of its largest size, rampages through the prawn swarm, frequently attacking and preying on the large prawns.
It was utter chaos! The ribbonfish were trying to prey on the shrimp, and the shrimp's internal organs were just as restless...
However, the swimming speed of sea shrimp is ultimately very limited, and it didn't take long for them to be caught up by the school of ribbonfish behind them.
Then a one-sided slaughter began. Faced with a piece of their diet, the ribbonfish showed no mercy to these shrimp. They only had animal instincts, which was to fill their stomachs.
About half an hour later, the fishing boat Yuxue arrived at the same spot, and its fish-finding equipment immediately detected the situation on the seabed.
Then, under the first mate's command, the fishing boat's direction was slightly adjusted, and it began to head towards the school of fish.
After the fish finder discovered the seabed conditions, the other crew members on the fishing boat also sprang into action, adjusting the height of the trawl net according to the first mate's request.
Faced with this large school of fish and shrimp, the fish finder could only detect one school of fish, and a very dense one at that, as well as the general area beyond which it could not detect any other information.
But that didn't matter anymore. As long as the school of fish was found, that was enough. The first mate immediately steered the fishing boat over and began fishing for the fish.
While the crew was fishing for the fish, Bai Yu and Wang Hai were still fast asleep, completely unaware of the situation the fishing boat was facing.
As before, the fishing boat drew four straight lines across the school of fish to divide it up, and then the crew on deck began to haul in the nets.
With the help of the winch, no matter how many fish are caught in the net, it will eventually be retrieved round and round.
After about two or three minutes, the head of the trawl net was already resting on the deck at the stern, waiting for the crew to operate it.
It was at this moment that the crew members who went forward discovered the abnormality inside the trawl net.
"Boss, something's not right with this catch. There are so many shrimp in here, and they're falling out of the net!"
When the trawl net is retrieved onto the deck, it floats on the sea surface because of the buoyancy ball around it.
Then the crew discovered that many shrimp had escaped through the mesh of the net and disappeared into the sea in a flash. There were also many ribbonfish that escaped through the mesh of the net in the same way.
The mesh of the large trawl net is indeed too big, about four or five fingers wide, which is very large for shrimp, and even smaller ribbonfish can escape.
Upon discovering this situation, the person in charge on deck, who was also the leader of this crew, immediately directed the other crew members to take action.
The current task is to pull the trawl net onto the deck as quickly as possible. This way, even if the shrimp and ribbonfish escape from the net...
They simply moved from trawls to deck fishing; the catch still belongs to the fishing boats.
However, while the crew was on their way, the person in charge was not idle. Instead, he reported the current situation to the first mate, who was in charge of the fishing boat, via walkie-talkie.
He asked the other party to send a few people to bring out the small trawl net from the storage room, as they would need to replace it after this haul.
This catch shows that most of the fish in the ocean are ribbonfish and shrimp. If a large trawl net were used, even more fish would escape through the mesh.
Although the crew members on the fishing boat work in shifts and usually do not interfere with each other's work, they still help each other and overcome difficulties together when faced with special circumstances.
Soon, several crew members came out of the cabin and started helping the crew on deck with their work.
To be honest, for seafood like ribbonfish and shrimp, a trawl net that is four or five fingers wide is still too wide, especially considering the large quantity of fish caught in such a net.
The 70-meter-long trawl net, with 40 to 50 meters of it filled with fish, needed to be divided into two parts and unloaded one after the other when it was hoisted to the unloading point by a crane.
During this process, countless shrimp and ribbonfish were pulled out of the net. The scene was so gruesome that it made one's scalp tingle and gave one a chill.
Let me give you an example: a trawl net, suspended by a crane, is divided into two sections. The net, laden with fish, looks like two sausages.
The ribbonfish and shrimp that fell through the net looked like two sausages that hadn't dried properly, already spoiled and infested with maggots. And these ribbonfish and shrimp just kept falling down from the trawl net.
Thankfully, Bai Yu and Wang Hai didn't see this scene. If they had, they probably wouldn't have had any appetite for lunch.
However, for the crew members on deck, these were minor scenes. It was like the place was infested with maggots; they had seen far more disgusting sights.
As mentioned earlier, some crew members have witnessed the phenomenon of a whale falling and giving rise to countless creatures. Moreover, what they saw was a dead whale infested with maggots and rotting with stench.
Twenty minutes later, when the first trawl net was cleared, the deck was a mess, covered with ribbonfish and shrimp.
In this situation, all the crew members on deck were wearing wading pants, the one-piece kind, and they carefully cleaned up the mess on the deck.
You can't go without wading pants. Ribbonfish are similar to barracudas; they also have a mouthful of sharp teeth. If you're wearing casual pants, it'll hurt terribly if one of them bites you.
After cleaning the No. 1 trawl net, the crew worked together to replace the trawl net on the winch, replacing the 40-meter trawl net used for catching smaller sea fish such as croaker.
This trawl net was purchased by the company after the first voyage before the Lunar New Year, when they made some money. Otherwise, the two sets of trawl nets given to them by the shipyard would have been too limited in variety.
This type of trawl net with slightly smaller mesh is perfect for catching ribbonfish and shrimp.
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