I've heard of sea cucumber and Shandong sea cucumber. Do you know Fujian sea cucumber?

In the early winter of each year, sea cucumber seedlings from Liaoning, Hebei and Shandong travel thousands of miles to the warm and rich southern waters to "winter". Xiapu County, Ningde City, Fujian Province, with superior marine conditions, has become a popular destination for sea cucumber "southward migration".

Boarding from Shang'ao Sea Terminal in Xiapu County and sailing to the depths of the inland sea, there are continuous fishing rafts on the sea along the way. About forty minutes later, the reporter's boat docked at the sea cucumber breeding base of Xiapu Seven Star Fish Row.

Qixing Fish Row Breeding Base. Photographed by Lin Xiaoli, a reporter of People's Daily Online

In a cage in the sea cucumber breeding base, there is a woven bamboo frame less than one meter deep underwater, covered with a net coat. When you look carefully inside, you can see that there are fat sea cucumbers lying on the net.

The person in charge of the breeding base said that a cage can support about 160 kg sea cucumbers, ranging in size from large to small. Now the cage breeding method is adopted, which saves the labor cost and is convenient for operation.

Near April, as the water temperature in the south gradually rises, the sea cucumber in Xiapu is also in harvest season. Some of the sea cucumbers captured from the cages are palm size. The person in charge of the above breeding base told the reporter that every year at this time of year, there will be guests from the north to collect sea cucumbers. Some will sell live sea cucumbers directly to merchants in the north, and some will be processed into semi-finished products and put into cold storage, and then listed when the price reaches the psychological expectations of farmers.

Some sea cucumbers captured from cages are as big as a palm. Photographed by Lin Xiaoli, a reporter of People's Daily Online

Xiapu County, located in the eastern coast of Fujian Province, is known as the "city of thousands of fresh foods". It has unique marine and fishery resources. In 2023, the output of aquaculture products in the county will exceed 1 million tons, with an output value of more than 20 billion yuan. Seawater aquaculture has become the pillar industry of Xiapu economy. As a "rising star", the sea cucumber industry has now formed an industry with an output value of 6.3 billion yuan, becoming the main production area of "north ginseng and south ginseng" in China.

Xiapu does not produce sea cucumber. Twenty one years ago, Xiapu County introduced sea cucumber seedlings from Shandong Long Island for the first time, and carried out indoor cement pool temporary cultivation test in the shrimp base. The next year, researchers moved a small number of relatively large seedlings to the sea area to carry out cage culture experiments. After more than half a year of cultivation, the average survival rate of the test results reached 86%, breaking the history of sea cucumber cultivation in the south.

In the north, because the proliferation and stocking of marine ranches are limited by the sea for aquaculture, the development space of sea cucumber is restricted. "The biggest advantage of the north-south relay breeding is that it has expanded the breeding space and broad prospects." Li Shumin, the former first level inspector of the Fishery and Fishery Administration of the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs, said that over the years, there have been obvious changes in the breeding methods of sea cucumbers, and the "north-south relay" breeding of sea cucumbers has become a new development model. "Sea cucumber seedlings from Shandong, Liaoning and other northern provinces were brought to Fujian for breeding in winter, and then returned to the north for breeding after the water temperature in Fujian sea area rose, which greatly shortened the breeding cycle."

Sea cucumber is a cold water species, which has high temperature dormancy and low temperature dormancy characteristics. From November to April of the next year, the water temperature in Xiapu sea area is suitable. Before the winter dormancy season in the north comes, the sea cucumber will be transferred to Xiapu for breeding, which is a reasonable use of natural resources in the north and south sea areas. Since 2007, the "north ginseng and south cultivation" has been developing continuously and incrementally in Xiapu County.

Sea cucumber breeding base in Xiapu. Photographed by Lin Xiaoli, a reporter of People's Daily Online

The industrial development often experienced a process from small to large, from scattered to whole, and the sea cucumber industry in Xiapu is no exception. At the stage of continuous expansion of the industrial scale, Xiapu is focusing on integrating resources, extending the industrial chain and improving the added value of the industrial chain.

Over the years, Xiapu County has actively guided the transformation and upgrading of local sea cucumber processing enterprises, basically meeting the needs of local live sea cucumber primary processing, and is also committed to promoting the transformation of sea cucumber industry production process from primary to deep processing.

At the same time, in 2021, Xiapu County signed a three-year framework agreement with the Yellow Sea Fisheries Research Institute of the Chinese Academy of Fishery Sciences to jointly set up the "Open Laboratory for Cooperation in Production, Teaching and Research of Sea Cucumber Culture in the South" and the "Xiapu Sea Cucumber Culture Technology Consulting Service Center", and establish a healthy culture technology system for sea cucumbers in suspended cages. At the same time, it has worked with Fujian Fisheries Research Institute to tackle key problems. At present, Xiapu County has mastered the local technological process for the localization of sea cucumber seedlings, and has made new breakthroughs in the autumn large-scale breeding of sea cucumber in China.

Guo Wensheng, secretary of Xiapu County Party Committee, said that the county is accelerating the construction of the whole industry chain of sea cucumber, realizing the continuous growth of sea cucumber breeding scale, output and output value. It is expected that the output value will exceed 10 billion yuan this year, becoming the first breeding variety with a single product scale of more than 10 billion yuan in the county.

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