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Giant cannibal shrimp worry Gulf Coast watchers
Just when you thought it was safe to go back in the Gulf of Mexico, a new menace, this one striped like a big cat, is preying on aquatic life: The black tiger shrimp.
The biggest saltwater shrimp in the world, black tigers “are cannibalistic as are other shrimp but it’s larger so it can consume the others,” Tony Reisinger, country extension agent for the Texas Sea Grant Extension Service, told CNN on Friday.
Because of the threat of disease, the predatory intruder poses a problem for the native shrimp and oyster population of the Gulf, Reisinger said.
"Our oystermen right now are hurting because the oyster season is shut down due to a red tide. But this (black tiger) shrimp poses other concerns,” he said.
Appearing more than 25 years ago, the black tiger’s sudden reappearance is a mystery.
“The first time they started appearing was in the late 1980s on the East Coast,” he said. “Then they disappeared in 1991.”
But following the record-breaking hurricane season of 2005, which brought successive monster storms Katrina, Rita and Wilma, they started showing up again, he said.
“They’re well over 1,000 of them in the Gulf of Mexico now,” he said. “We’ve had five of them caught off Texas.”
Reisinger said he spoke to the Brownsville-Port Isabel Shrimp Producers Association recently to warn them about the shrimp but he was too late.
“It turns our fishermen have been catching them for a while, but they didn’t think they were marketable so they were throwing them back,” he said.
Is there a harvestable population already established in the Gulf? What does that mean for the Louisiana and South Texas shrimp and oyster industry? Many questions remain, Reisinger said.
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Here, let me figure out shrimp per square footage...what a joke. If you know there's 1000, because you counted them, go get them, so that don't hurt the fishing industry. Send out a trained dolphin.
Basically...... That made me chuckle a bit..... Makes perfect sense though....
caused due to the oil spill...mutated shrimp, lol
they're probably tea partiers too
I totally agree! Mutation must be the cause. Shrimps are getting evolved
i agree w/mutation of the shrimp because of oil spill
Cook'em up and eat them!
Heck yeah, cook them up like lobsters!!!!!!!
just tell the chinese about it and they will eat them to extinction
Now that's funny...and sadly true!
What's so funny about that? The racists Americans will eat them as well!
start offering the shrimpmen a bounty on them!
Are they edible? Why not harvest them if they are and sell them? It would seem to me that a giant shrimp braised and served with a nice garlic butter dip would be great! Does anyone know their natural habitat? Also, have they been mutated by all the chemicals poured into the Gulf during the oil well blow out?
Instead of calling them Black Tigers call them Gulf Lobster Shrimps...
I would bet that they are from very deep water. They got washed back in by the big storms.
Do you guys actually read the article? They started showing up AGAIN after a series of hurricanes hit the area a few years back. They were there in the 80s as well. The oil leak last year had nothing to do with them.
I wish that the article would have given more information about weather they were edible or not That's the first thing i thought about!
so send a message to all fisherman that the game & wildlife will pay $20 for each one caught. the fisherman will no longer throw them back.
I like that idea
So how do we know there are 1000 of them? That makes no sense without further context.
Why The Count counted them, of course. One at a time.
One shrimpy whimpy, two shrimpy whimpy, three! Three shrimpy whimpy, ahhh ahhh ahhhhhhhh
Looks edible to me.
Oh no! It's Shrimpzilla! I wonder how they taste.
Are you kidding?! Steam those suckers up and dip them in butter – you'll see how marketable they are ...
This is what happens when regular shrimp consume crude and surfactants. It is the GODZILLA of Shrimp. I blame the Republicans.
Sorry, my bad. You posted the zilla shrimp comment first.
So what's wrong with a few petroleum byproducts in your diet?
You a vegetarian or something?
Do you guys actually read the article? They started showing up AGAIN after a series of hurricanes hit the area a few years back. They were there in the 80s as well. The oil leak last year had nothing to do with them.
Zilla shrimp! I bet they taste bad.
I bet that critter would make one hell of a scampi!
Giant shrimp? That's seems contradictary like "military intelligence".
LOL, I give you three points for that from half court!