The brown shirmp is caught in the coastal waters of North Western Europe using the trawler method. A trawler net is a net that is dragged forward next to the cutter. The net is kept open through the ‘beam’ that consists of a number of light rubber bobbins (‘rollers’) in the case of shrimping that are dragged over the bottom. The advantage of these bobbins is that the bottom is scarcely churned. The bobbins roll over the sand. Shrimp is startled and are trapped by the net. A shrimp cutter usually works with two trawl nets; one on each side of the vessel.
The catch is placed in screening brine boxes on board which quickly separate the by-catch from the shrimp. This by-catch (fish, jellyfish, crabs, undersized shrimp) is thrown overboard as quickly as possible. The screening brine box method is very effective: between 90% and 95% of the by-catch is thrown back overboard. Next, the stones and shells are separated from the shrimp in a separate brine box and the shrimp is rinsed.
The next step is also carried out on board: cooking. Cooking has a disinfecting effect on the shrimp. The cooking time is around five minutes. Shrimp will change its colour during the cooking process from grey to pink. The shrimp is put in plastic bags after cooking and are kept at a temperature of approximately 2ºC until they reach the fish auction where they are sold to companies such as Heiploeg.
On board of the currently used shrimping cutters, the whole process is virtually mechanical and automated. This, of course, is beneficial for effectiveness but also for the quality of the supplied shrimp.
A lot of shrimp is supplied by the Dutch fleet on an annual basis. The average quantity in the last years is more than 10,000 tons with an average unit quantity of 700 shrimp per kilo. That is more than 7 billion shrimp. On the face of it, this is an enormous quantity that begs the question whether the sea is not being fished out.
Fortunately this is not the case. Shrimping fishes around 5% of the total amount of shrimp on an annual basis. Between 45% and 50% of the shrimp is caught by fish such as cod and similar fish on an annual basis. Approximately half remains to ensure that reproduction is assured. A simple sum will show that there would still be around 80 billion…
Shrimp is also fished for Heiploeg in warmer waters, for example, in South East Asia. The larger and more expensive species are nowadays often cultivated in shrimp farms in those countries.
