Grandpa Chen had just finished cleaning up the harvested shrimp when he happily turned around and got into the driver's seat.
Before long, the fishing boat arrived at the spot where the fishing nets were to be set up.
Before the fishing boat had even come to a complete stop, Chen Zhiyao noticed small ripples spreading across the surrounding sea.
It seems the sticky net below is yielding a good harvest.
The four nets were lowered into the ground in order of increasing mesh size. The first net to be pulled up was the one with the smallest mesh.
As the fishing net slowly rose from the deep sea under the powerful pull of the robotic arm, Chen Zhiyao's smile grew even brighter.
Upon closer inspection, the net was densely covered with lively mackerel and angelfish.
Grandma Chen, who was closest to the net, smiled broadly as she pulled the net over and started working.
The old lady said cheerfully as she worked:
"These mackerel are quite large, each weighing about half a pound."
Chen Weiqiang, who was standing next to him, was holding a dwarf fish and also said with a smile:
"I must say, these angelfish are quite large; this net is worth a lot of money."
There were so many fish that the whole family worked frantically for a good ten minutes before they were able to untangle them from the net and take them off one by one.
These small fish may not look big, but there are a lot of them; they weigh at least 300 jin (150 kg) in total.
However, the real surprise is yet to come!
When Chen Zhiyao pulled up the second net with great anticipation, what she saw was a delightful surprise.
The fishing net was covered with large patches of yellowfin tuna, interspersed with a few white pomfret weighing over a pound.
From a distance, the fishing nets gleamed white, shining brightly in the sunlight.
The fish were already terrified of being stuck in the net.
Now that they were suddenly pulled out of the water, the timid fish were thrown into panic.
At this moment, the fish in the net sensed the impending danger and began to struggle and writhe frantically.
The energetic fish vigorously swung its tail and body, making a splashing sound.
These sounds intertwined and miraculously merged into a joyful ode to the harvest.
Chen Zhiyao skillfully operated the robotic arm, slowly pulling the net up little by little.
Standing to the side were Yan Shuting and her husband, as well as Grandma Chen. The three of them deftly untied the fish from the net one by one.
Before long, they harvested several baskets of yellowfin tuna and a full bucket of white pomfret.
The third gillnet didn't yield many fish, but it did have a good variety of species.
There were two or three of almost every kind of fish: pearl grouper, sea bass, turbot, silver carp, white pomfret, yellowfin tuna, and barracuda.
These fish are of average size, weighing only about 100 kilograms in total.
Despite the large catch these past two days, this net is actually the normal level.
If Chen Zhiyao hadn't added bait to the net, the harvest would probably have been even worse.
The net with the thickest mesh yielded a total of three sea bass, two tiger grouper, two sesame grouper, one green grouper, and one wavy grouper.
The net was full of large groupers weighing over 5 kilograms each. The people on the boat were very excited, and their mouths turned up in uncontrollable grins.
The trap was placed close to the second net, and it was almost entirely filled with yellowfin tuna and white pomfret.
Chen Zhiyao put a lot of bait in the fish traps, and the greedy little fish gathered around, filling the traps to the brim.
However, there were exceptions. In the last trap, there wasn't a single fish, only a lone giant eel.
In addition, there were two leftover green crab legs in the cage.
Looking at the remaining two crab legs, Chen Zhiyao felt a little regretful, as the crab was quite large.
Conger eels are fierce, so they can't be kept with other fish.
Chen Weiqiang deliberately put it in the same bucket as the conger eel he had just caught in the shrimp trap.
The crab season is over, so the crab traps are only so-so.
The 10 crab traps together only contained about 8 pounds of crabs, and they all looked rather thin.
After some picking and choosing, and releasing the smaller and pregnant crabs, only about 5 jin (2.5 catties) of crabs remained in total.
Although the crab harvest was less, the addition of shrimp traps meant that the overall harvest only increased.
Another bountiful day!
After collaborating several times, Chen Zhiyao and Manager Yang from the seafood restaurant became quite familiar with each other.
Today's haul was good; we caught not only red snapper and bluefin bream, but also two large eels.
On her way back, she made a point of contacting Manager Yang.
However, the red snapper and bluefin tuna today were not very big, but the two conger eels were of a good size. Other suppliers also delivered conger eels today.
After chatting with everyone, Manager Yang only took a liking to the larger lobsters, mantis shrimps, and zebra mantis shrimps.
"Small green lobsters weighing over one jin are 230 yuan per jin. Mantis shrimp weighing over half a jin are 210 yuan per jin. I'll take all the zebra mantis shrimp, they'll all be 365 yuan per jin."
Manager Yang offered a slightly higher price than the purchasing station, but only by a tiny margin.
Since the quantity needed is not large, the total amount will probably only be about a hundred and a few dozen yuan more than what the purchasing station would offer.
The money wasn't much, and Chen Zhiyao, having been busy all day, was too lazy to make the special trip.
She politely declined Manager Yang's offer, then contacted Yang Jiajun, intending to send all the fish to the purchasing station.
Everyone has their own area of expertise; there's no need to try to earn money from everything.
As soon as the fishing boat docked, Boss Yang came over with two strong middle-aged men to help.
Baskets of fresh seafood were loaded onto the vehicle, and soon the group arrived at Yang's purchasing station.
Yang Jiajun, calculator in hand, busily directed his two assistants to weigh the fish catch:
"So many small green dragons, it seems you've stirred up a hornet's nest. The big ones are 220 yuan per jin, the small ones are 180 yuan per jin, that's 2840 yuan in total."
"Large mantis shrimp cost 200 yuan per jin, and small ones cost 160 yuan per jin, totaling 2230 yuan."
"The other prawns and tiger prawns are all priced at 30 yuan per jin, totaling 86 jin, which is 2580 yuan."
Seeing so many large prawns, many of which were still covered in roe, Yang Jiajun was in a very good mood. He figured he could make a profit by selling them.
Then, he turned his gaze to the sea fish next to him.
"The mackerel and angelfish this time are quite large, so let's set the price at 7 yuan per jin. There are 568 jin in total, which is 3976 yuan."
"These yellow-footed wax trees look quite vigorous. Let's price them at 40 yuan per jin. There are 388 jin in total, which is 100 yuan."
"These white pomfret are of good size, 30 yuan per jin, 220 jin, totaling 6600 yuan."
...
The three of them worked for quite a while before they finally calculated the catch from the nets and various cages, which totaled 49,166 yuan.
When split among themselves, each person earned nearly 10,000 yuan.
According to the old custom, the catch from the fishing boat is divided equally among everyone, while the catch from beachcombing, fishing, and diving is the responsibility of each individual.
Chen Zhiyao caught a variety of seafood, including sea cucumbers, zebras, and mantis shrimps, along with a large number of sea snails and shellfish from beachcombing, earning a total of 9,966 yuan.
Others also had good results, with most earning several thousand dollars.
At the end of the day, the Chen family's income was as follows:
Grandpa Chen: block
Grandma Chen: A piece.
Chen Weiqiang: Block.
Yan Shuting: Block.
Chen Zhiyao: Block.
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