Asian Tiger Shrimp caught in Halifax River, Ormond Beach, Florida

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This was a pretty interesting catch and worthy of a post! My Dad was trying to catch some bait in the Halifax River, North of the Ormond Beach bridge when he caught this monster shrimp in his cast net. If you know my Dad, you know he likes to shrimp like I like to hunt and he has shrimped the Halifax River all his life and never laid eyes on one of these things before.

It is called an Asian Tiger shrimp and is considered an invasive species. Though not officially considered established, their numbers are on the rise.

This one was nearly 10" long and weighed 1/4 of a pound!

 

 

 

"USGS has been tracking reports of Asian tiger shrimp since they first surfaced back in 1988, when nearly 300 of them were collected off the coasts of South Carolina, Georgia and Florida within three months. Scientists tracked the cause back to an isolated incident that accidentally caused an estimated 2,000 animals to be released from an aquaculture facility operating in South Carolina.

 

It was not until 18 years later that reports of additional Tiger shrimp surfaced. In 2006, a commercial shrimp fisherman caught a single adult male in Mississippi Sound near Dauphin Island, Ala. Within months, additional specimens were noted in North Carolina’s Pamlico Sound, Louisiana’s Vermilion Bay and other parts of Florida and the Carolinas. The species was later reported off the coasts of Georgia, Mississippi and Texas in 2008, 2009 and 2011."  (NOAA, April 26, 2012)

If you would like to know more about the Asian Tiger Shrimp, the USGS site has additional information and photo's. Here is a link to the story:

http://www.noaanews.noaa.gov/stories2012/20120426_tigershrimp.html

 

Larry S.