Penghu County Agriculture and Fisheries Bureau releases swimming crab seedlings, hoping to create 40 million yuan in output value

On the 19th, the Penghu County Agriculture and Fisheries Bureau's Aquatic Seedling Propagation Station released 15,000 self-bred "blue swimming crab" (sand crab) seedlings in the intertidal zone of the Qingwan sea area. Penghu County Magistrate Lai Feng-wei, attending the release, said that releasing sand crabs can enrich fishery resources, and he hopes that in the future it can create 4,000 in sand crab output value each year, restoring vitality to the fishing industry.

Magistrate Lai Feng-wei said that Penghu has so far accumulated about 300,000 released sand crab seedlings, with a survival rate of about 25%, and they are expected to reach marketable size after 1 year, creating about 15 million yuan in output value. In the future, through industry-government-academia cooperation, it is estimated that 40 million yuan in output value can be created, and sand crabs can become an iconic product of Penghu's tourism industry.

Chen Jing-hui, Director of the Penghu County Agriculture and Fisheries Bureau, said that the seedling station will further combine natural seaweed and seagrass bed resources to release more types of shrimp, crabs, snails and shellfish. This year, in crab seedling cultivation, it cooperated with the Fisheries Research Institute to release seedlings on artificial Sargassum floating reefs, successfully establishing a mass-production model for juvenile crabs. In the future, it will continue to conduct release resource surveys and effectiveness assessments to enhance release capacity.

In recent years, the Penghu County Agriculture and Fisheries Bureau's Seedling Propagation Station has actively cultivated various economic seedlings, such as sand crabs, yellowfin seabream, red seabream, sea urchins, and crystal conch, revitalizing marine fishery resources, increasing the variety of coastal marine resources, and injecting new vitality into Penghu's marine resources.