It makes no sense to me. This is the first time in 20 years I have not bait shrimped. Commercial Shrimpers are going out of business and are becoming a non factor, we have had several warm winters, but some how the shrimping seems to get suckier every year??? I remember back in the 90s and early 2k coolering about 75% of the time. Last year was the worst season for me and I just decided this year i was not going to fool with it. Here is what I know:
There are far less commercial shrimpers now than there were 10 to 15 years ago.
There are far less recreational bait shrimpers than there were `10 to 15 years ago.
There are far less shrimp than were 10 to 15 years ago.
It sure has been disappointing once again this year to see more posts about things other than shrimp reports. Fishboy I wonder about the same thing. Not knocking your post, just wish we were all doing better shrimping! My guess is changes in salinity and water temp. Some people just can’t help themselves by injecting politics into things though.
I also think it’s pollution more than anything else. Fertilizers, pesticides, weed killers run off from all the nice waterfront homes and golf courses are what’s killing the shrimp. I’ve been shrimping around here for 50 years and it used to be a lot better than it is now. 50 years ago there were probably 150+ shrimp trawlers working out of Thunderbolt. Today I think there are less than 10.
You can still catch a good mess if you know how, when and where, but it’s not as easy as it used to be.
Capt. Larry Teuton
Cracker Built Custom Boats
“Ships are the nearest things to dreams that hands have ever made.” -Robert N. Rose
Hey guys, I don’t shrimp due to the nonresident $500 baiting license.
I have been buying three hundred plus pounds (jumbo headed) each fall off the boats in Beaufort/St Helena, distribute to many folks and fill my freezer for the year.
When I called them the other day the price was more than double from previous years!!! WOW.
They told me that there were no North Carolina Trawlers hear this year due to no shrimp. Also said they had one of theirs out all day dragging two big nets and came in with 73 lbs. Another WOW!
They were guessing it was from all the rain…flooding rains due result in runoff of pollutants as y’all mentioned above.
quote:Hey guys, I don't shrimp due to the nonresident $500 baiting license.
I’m non-resident too, even though I can almost see SC from my house. You don’t have to bait to catch a cooler full of shrimp. Or a half cooler, or whatever the trip yields. I’ve never bought a bait tag in my life, never had a freezer without shrimp in it either. You don’t have to bait to catch shrimp. I usually do as well without bait as most of the baiting reports on here.
Capt. Larry Teuton
Cracker Built Custom Boats
“Ships are the nearest things to dreams that hands have ever made.” -Robert N. Rose
I am relatively new to bait shrimping but as I recall year before last and last year where a lot worse than this season has been, at least that is the way it seems to me and the crew I go with. We went to the harbor last night off from the golf course (a little rain never hurt anyone) and started throwing right about dusk (should have started sooner) the shrimp where there and we got about a half cooler in two passes of mostly medium/large. then they started to slow way down. took a break and cured our thirst went back at it for 5 more passes to get a little over another 1/4 cooler again mostly medium/large but more smalls showed up. We pulled poles around 9:30 with a little over 3/4 of a cooler (have to work today). Point being this year is better for us than the past two and it isn’t over yet…we’ll be out there when we can…
“Computers allow you to make mistakes faster than any invention known to man; except for maybe Tequila and a pistol”… (author unknown)
quote:I am relatively new to bait shrimping but as I recall year before last and last year where a lot worse than this season has been
That’s because the last two years we were having a drought, a 10 year drought actually. Shrimp need some rain to grow and this year we had a lot of rain.
Capt. Larry Teuton
Cracker Built Custom Boats
“Ships are the nearest things to dreams that hands have ever made.” -Robert N. Rose
I am glad some one finally noticed the issues with the dying shrimping industry. you would not hear anything about it from the DNR because,They are trying to sell license.I have been a commercial shrimper all my life. I started out in the 60’s working summers on my dad’s boats as well as playing in the rivers. the years back then when we did not have shrimp it was related to cold winters killing off the overwintering white shrimp that produced the following years fall crop of white shrimp(the money crop). We had good seasons when we had a lot of rain(1973) was one that came to mind when I read an article in the paper a few weeks or months go about spring and summer rain.That year was wetter than this year and the commercial season was still above average.
Around 1989 the yr of HUGO as well as the Sandifer years when the SCDNR was promoting RRAISING Shrimp IN POnds. WE in the commercial secter of shrimping noticed rivers dying off of shrimp. Mainly Colleton River in Port Royal Calibogue area and South Edisto. At te time we had Libby Ambrosh Producing all kinds of documentation about deseases in farm raised shrimp getting in the wild crop but Sandifer and others in DNR did not want to hear it. I could go on and on about this but it aint pollution killing the shrimp it is deseases, BLack gill was in the ponds on Edisto in the late 80’s and early 90’s. It broke all kinds of investors. The waddell center was started in 1989 to promote shrimp Aquaculture and it is on the Colleton river. I think it took this long for the desease to spread to the north to georgetown and south to Daytona.
I don’t know what it will take to bring the shrimp back. This has been the worst AUGUST<SEPTEMBER I have ever experienced in ST Helena sound as a commercial shrimper since 1977 which was after one of the coldest winters on record. This past winter was one of the mildest on record and we don’t have any. They are small ones in the creeks and sound and as soon as they should get big enough to move offshore they dissappear. something
I’m with you RB…I have been shrimping the harbor and BB for almost 30 yrs now, with and without bait. There is definitely a problem going on. The shrimp population is nothing what it used to be and the problem is consistent. Up until about 5 yrs ago, or so, we would always have a few days with slack coolers, but when they were there, you loaded up quick. I’m not talking about these “mixed” coolers you hear lots talking about. I can still fill up a cooler full of bait shrimp any day pretty quick. I’m talking about the grown shrimp. For the last few years it has taken at least 10-15 passes to get even close to a cooler full. Frankly, I’m getting too old for that kind of exercise. Maybe it’s those trillions of endangered BSBs that are wiping them out. I don’t know, but something is happening that’s for sure.
Shrimp are the number one commercial fishery in the southeast. DNR does sampling every year of the local shrimp population. If black gill was killing them in massive numbers, I think it would turn up in the surveys. Two things I found interesting were the SCECAP Technical Report and the graph showing the white shrimp abundance from 1999 through 2012. And finally, a quote below from their study. My takeaway is we are still suffering consequences of a decade-long drought, despite the relatively wet summer we had this year.
“Data were collected from DNR’s Crustacean and SCECAP surveys. DNR surveys indicate that white shrimp stocks were below average in 2012, due to drought, unusually early spawning, and unfavorable wind conditions which yielded less than ideal recruitment of small shrimp. Stocks should improve if subsequent weather is favorable. Conditions in the 1990s were more conducive to good shrimp production, with adequate rainfall in most years, whereas drought conditions have been more prevalent in the past decade.”
I always thought it was the drought also until this year and when we started coming out of the drought conditions in early spring I figured we would have had an abundant crop. plenty of rain and mild winter so we had the seed to have a good crop. then the next thing people start saying is TOO much Rain. WElll my dictionary says drought is lack of rain well if drought is the problem then why has shrimping not rebounded this year with all the rain. Now the wildlife is saying Too much Rain. They DON’T KNOW AND AINT MUCH THEY COULD DO ABOUT IT. IF THEY DID SO THEY COME UP WITH STATEMENTS TO KEEP PEOPLE INTERESTED AND BUYING LISCENCE. THEY NEED THE REVENUE. . well look at the data 1973 was one of the wettest springs ever and we had a good crop of shrimp for the commercial industry. This was before the recreational sector even started. The sounds were open to trawling and there was plenty of shrimp.
WE have issues with diseases in the shrimp. IT has been proven that Black gill kills shrimp as well as other viruses. A virus has wiped out the salt water catfish that was so prevalent around here in the 60’s through 90’s. I have not seen one in a couple of years. hope for our sake the shrimp situation can fix itself before this happens with them
Global warming! LOL!
Will be at yalls place in the morning to try em RB. Bringing the rods just in case.
Didn’t shrimp for seven years after my father passed, just didn’t seem the same. Shrimped 8 times last year and got around 5 coolers. I have been 3 times this year and caught right at 1/2 each time, nothing like it use to be.
thanks for all the info fellas.
It may be something, or it may be nothing… I’ve seen so much more “brown gills” and so many of the shrimp we’ve caught have been filled with cottonhead… Both this year and last.
Wow, I hate to hear about polution possibly causing virus and population decrease and also local news has been reporting on dolphin sickness and a lot of washed up dead dolphins
