An Unique Activity-- Shrimp Fishing釣蝦

     Why is shrimp fishing so unique that it triggered me to write this article? Well, I believe most people think about shrimp fishing is taking a net to catch shrimp in rivers or oceans. But when we talk about shrimp fishing in Taiwan as a leisure activity, we mean we catch shrimp with a fishing rod and line in a manmade indoor pool.

     As I know, shrimp fishing has been in Taiwan for more than 15 years. I have no clued about how it started or anything about this activity. But, definitely whoever started this idea was very cleaver for lots of people pay money to participate in this activity.      

we met our friend' friends who had many years
 experiences in shrimp fishing. He was going to 
teach us how to catch shrimp.

     This was the first time my husband and I went for shrimping in Taiwan when we visited our friends in Ilan County. It was an event for my friend's family and their colleagues' families to get together to share good time on a Saturday night. We were very honored to be invited to this event.  

We were there just after sunset. There were some other
groups of people already there to enjoy the Saturday
night with friends. There were a total of three manmade
pools inside the building and one was empty which 
was set up for deep sea fishing.

Some people used different baits for shrimping like 
worms or some chicken's liver with shrimp favor 
powder to attract shrimp. I had no patience to sit 
there doing nothing or try to compete with the shrimp 
to see who was more smart, human beings or shrimp? 
Also I hated worms and couldn't stand how they crawled 
on top of each others. The only things I liked were to 
share their excitements when they caught shrimp or 
learning something about this activity.

This net was for the shrimp that people caught.

There were also some manmade outdoor pools with an 
aerator (putting oxygen into the water) which were very 
common in the countryside on the west coast for raising 
different kinds of fish. 

The price for using this outdoor facility was NT$ 1,800
for 3 hours and 1.5 hours for NT$1,200. If someone
catches a small ocean grouper, he or she could sell the 
grouper  back to the store for NT$100 dollars. If 
someone catches a gentian grouper over 18 kgs, the 
customer must release the fish back into the pond and 
the store will pay NT $3,000 to compensate the customer. 

My husband caught his first shrimp
after several minutes practice. 

The store also offered food to its customers for
indoor BBQing. 

This was a traditional Taiwanese style BBQ with
a small charco grill.

The fun of the BBQ was parents and kids could work
together as a team to promote their relationship and it
also served as a learning process for children. 

There were some cleaning areas for people to wash
their shrimp or fish. The store also offered sea salt for
people to add on their shrimp before BBQ. The store
 also helped its customers to process their food with
 a small fee.

We had plenty of fresh shrimp. It tasted
delicious when sharing with good friends
and having a good time.

    This was our first experience in shrimp fishing. It was a fun activity. But I didn't enjoy the indoor BBQ part because of lacking fresh air circulaion. The air was filled with smoke and the windows were closed. It was really bad jut like committing slow suicide to me. However, there are some shrimp farms offering only shrimp fishing that you don't have to endure the smoking environment when you feel lucky. 

     When I was searching about shrimp fishing activity in Taiwan, I found this article below written by an American who came to Taiwan for a trade show about his shrimping experience in Taiwan. It was an interesting story. 

http://www.tackletour.com/reviewshrimptw.html