Shrimp catches in the Mar Menor are climbing back to previous levels after the deficiencies experienced by fishermen during the recent catastrophic months.
The San Pedro auctions are once again closing with a good price and the number kilos caught per day are returning to the averages that were seen prior to the recent bad weather.
After episodes of heavy rainfall in the Mar Menor during March and April, which deposited all kinds of sediment into the lagoon, catches fell to worrying levels. “Nothing was fished until recently,” says the chairman of the San Pedro brotherhood, José Blaya, who said that “we thought there was no more shrimp.”
In the last month, however, the catches have improved by 80%, now reaching an average of between 250 and 350 kilos. The fishermen attribute this improvement in the fishing to an ecological improvement of the salty lagoon. The price at the fish market is currently 25 euros per kilo, but depending on the amount caught, the price could increase to 35 euros per kilo.
Shrimp fishing is now better than it was at the end of the campaign last year, a few months before we saw the fish mortality and anoxia in the Mar Menor. Blaya says that he now hopes that, during the remainder of the campaign, another twenty days or so, a positive trend will continue as the fishermen persist in bringing home good catches.
