1983Fishing and Farming between Mountains and Seas

Chapter 134: Catch Them All (with Pictures)
Since these fish only swim in the shallows near the reefs and not in deep water, it is not suitable to catch them by boat.

Liang Ziqiang picked up an empty bucket and took two fishing nets from the boat and carried them on his shoulders, intending to run to the beach and stand in the shallow water to fish.

He ran very fast, and when he returned to the beach again, the fish were still there. They did not swim farther out to sea, but were swimming back and forth on the water near the reefs.

Worried that after casting the net, the other fish would be frightened and run away without a trace, he quickly stuffed one of the fishing nets on his shoulder into Lin Baixian's hands:

"Catch it now! You're in luck. Use my net, and all the fish you catch are yours!"

Lin Baixian's face was as bright as a golden chrysanthemum, and he showed a little courtesy:
"You cast the seeds where there are more fish, and I'll cast them where there are fewer!"

Liang Ziqiang didn't need any instructions. He immediately held up his net, walked into the water, and headed towards the bright stars.

When we first discovered them, there were only about three or four of them. Now, a lot more have emerged from the reefs. At a glance, there are probably more than a dozen of them!

There were seven or eight of them that were relatively close to each other, making them convenient for catching. Liang Ziqiang spotted them and immediately cast his fishing net over the water.

Beside him, Lin Baixian also threw out fishing nets at another five or six fish almost at the same time.

For a moment, bright yellow flowers jumped in the fishing nets of both people, like clusters of rape flowers trembling in the wind, chaotic but very beautiful.

Casting the net in this special situation is different from fishing in deeper waters. It does not take too long to wait for the net to slowly sink. After seeing seven or eight blue-billed brides completely caught in the net, Liang Ziqiang pulled the net in, trying to use as little force as possible, and slowly pulled the net closer to his feet.

It is necessary to be gentle when treating this kind of fish. After all, it is not like catching fish for food, where you don't care whether it is dead or alive, as long as you catch it. This fish must be kept alive, so that people will be willing to spend money to buy it and keep it in their fish tank as a landscape.

After the fishing net was pulled over, Jiang Wen'ang was actually willing to help. He cooperated very well and picked up the empty bucket on the beach. He also found a place with clear sea water nearby, filled half a bucket with sea water, and pushed it towards Liang Ziqiang.

Liang Ziqiang took the bucket and let it float on the water. Then he put the fishing net into the bucket with the opening facing downwards. He slowly loosened the opening and let the bride fish in the net slide into the bucket one by one.

I counted them and found that there were more than I expected, a total of nine.

The nine fish were obviously adult fish and were not small in size. The small ones weighed about 70 to 80 grams, and the big ones were nearly one kilogram each.

The Blue-billed Bride is a type of angelfish. This fish is prettier when it grows up than when it was a juvenile. Although it is also bright yellow all over when it is a juvenile, there is a black vertical stripe on its face that runs through its eyes, and there is also a round black spot at the end of its tail fin, which is a bit messy.

As it grows into an adult, its body becomes purer and purer, the circular black spots and vertical lines on its face gradually fade, while its mouth begins to change color, turning into a bright blue. The large area of ​​bright yellow is dotted with a little abrupt blue, and the two colors contrast with each other, making it particularly bright.

After a while, Lin Baixian also collected his net and came over. He counted and found that he had caught five in total. After counting, he poured them all into the bucket.

Jiang Wenang counted them again: "There are fourteen in total. I wonder if there are any more on the sea?"

The four of them opened their eyes wide and searched the sea surface back and forth, but they didn't see any fish.

In fact, it is obvious whether there is one or not. The sea water is light blue and this fish is bright yellow. It is too conspicuous to be found on the sea surface.

The two men's attacks just now were fast and accurate. I guess most of the fish have been caught in their nets. The occasional two or three that slipped through the net must have escaped towards the deeper water.

“I wonder if there are any more in the reef?”

Liang Ziqiang saw with his own eyes that these fish swam out from those reefs. If he must continue looking, he thought he could look among the reefs.

"Then let's go look for it on the reef. Anyway, no matter how big or small it is, I'll give you five yuan!" Jiang Wenang agreed immediately. The two walked to the reef and searched in the water under the reef, especially the concave places, which would become their main search targets.

Unfortunately, the expected "fish nest" did not appear. It seems that the dozen or so fish just now are almost the entire lineup of this group of blue-mouthed bride fish. After all, according to Liang Ziqiang's understanding, blue-mouthed bride fish are not the kind of fish that gather in large groups.

After searching for about ten minutes, Liang Ziqiang finally found three more, but he couldn't use a fishing net among the rocks, and other tools were also useless, so he had to catch them all with his bare hands.

Liang Ziqiang was quite agile in catching fish. He caught two and one escaped.

Lin Baixian also caught two, but he didn't control the strength well, and one of them was tightly grasped by him, and then hit the corner of the reef, bleeding a lot. The originally pure yellow fish was made into a miserable mess by him...

Lin Baixian waved the rotten fish in his hand, which was about to die, and said to Jiang Wenang:

"Brother Jiang, I didn't catch this one well enough, so I don't think it will survive, but the taste shouldn't be affected when you eat it. At most, it won't be as fresh as the other dozen or so. How about I give you a discount, like 4.50 yuan for this one?"

Hearing this, Jiang Wen'ang and Liang Ziqiang were almost angry to death.

It seems that Lin Baixian has been catching fish for a long time, but he still hasn't figured out that this fish is not for eating at all, but an ornamental fish?

On second thought, it's not surprising. Almost all the fishermen in the village, including Lin Baixian, usually make a living by fishing for food. They know all the edible and delicious fish, shrimps and crabs in the sea, but they don't recognize many of the various ornamental fish hiding in the reefs.

Most of the villagers probably can't name the fish in front of them. After all, they don't usually study it specifically, and they are not like Liang Ziqiang who can watch the ocean channel of later generations.

After Jiang Wenang had experienced the life-and-death catastrophe earlier, he no longer pretended to be elegant in front of them. He snorted and said dissatisfiedly:
"Are you kidding me? I've been in the ornamental fish business for several years, and I've never heard of anyone eating blue-mouthed bride fish!"

It turns out that Jiang Wenang’s business is specializing in the buying and selling of ornamental fish?

After hearing this, Liang Ziqiang finally understood why Jiang Wenang said before leaving for the island that he was indeed in the marine fish business, but not selling seafood.

Buying and selling marine ornamental fish really has nothing to do with seafood!

Lin Baixian was also dumbfounded: "Ah, this is for viewing? Then this one is hopeless, why didn't you tell me earlier? I would have been more careful. What a waste of my five dollars!"

Jiang Wenang was speechless again: "You have time to waste, why not go to other reefs to look for it! There is a blue-mouthed bride here, maybe there are other valuable ornamental fish!"

When Lin Baixian heard this, his thoughts immediately became clearer. He grabbed Liang Ziqiang and ran away:
"That's right, that's right. Let's just search all the reefs on this island today and go back tomorrow!"

In fact, of course, it didn't take that long. The two searched five or six reefs in a row, but found neither other ornamental fish nor a blue-mouthed bride fish.

It seems that this island is not really a suitable place for ornamental fish to live, but there are just a few blue-billed brides who have come here recently by chance.

Although the two returned empty-handed, they each caught some saw-eyed mud crabs.

Seeing that they could not find any other gains and it was getting too late, the four of them got on the boat and started sailing back.

There was no scale on the boat, so it was impossible to estimate the weight of the abalone in the bucket. Jiang Wenang agreed with them that when they got to the shore, Liang Ziqiang would go find a scale, weigh it, and settle the bill for them on the shore.

(Two pictures of the blue-mouthed bride fish have been posted in the comment section below.)
In response to everyone's expectation for more updates, an additional update will be made at noon and will be published in a few dozen minutes.

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(End of this chapter)