471: Chapter 471 Leaving Zhongsha Atoll

Besides the densely packed Sardines, each about twenty centimeters long, the deck was mostly covered with Skipjack Tuna and Barracuda weighing between ten and twenty jin.

"Yang Qi, do you want to cast another net?"

Chen Sheng asked with a grin, his eyes sparkling with excitement.

"No need, let's process the fish on the deck first!"

Yang Qi had long noticed that most of that school had already been caught by them, so there was no need to wipe them out completely.

Wang Jinxi and Ding Kuan immediately took their Gaffs, dragged the four Bigeye Tuna out of the mountain of fish, and pulled them aside to bleed them.

Everyone else surrounded the pile of fish and began sorting the various sea fish. Originally, Sardines could also be graded, but Yang Qi felt that would be too much trouble.

Thus, the Sardines were uniformly packed into fish baskets, which indeed sped things up considerably.

The remaining fish, like the Skipjack Tuna, Barracuda, and Mahi-Mahi, all had to be bled and processed.

As a pseudo-Tuna, Skipjack Tuna was slightly better; once bled, it could still sell for dozens of yuan per jin.

However, fish like Barracuda wouldn't fetch a good price even after being bled; they were truly a bit like chicken ribs—useless.

Even Coal didn't like to eat them; in the end, they were mostly used as chumming material.

Yang Qi picked out some Skipjack Tuna weighing three or four jin and kept them in the live bait tank for Tuna fishing. All the others were bled, processed, and sent to the Freezer Hold for preservation.

Visually estimating, the total income from this single net should exceed 300,000 to 400,000 yuan. Everyone was very happy.

"Chen Gang, Chen Lin, make some more fried Sardines later. The brothers can have them as snacks!"

Yang Qi instructed.

"Alright, Yang Qi, I got it. I'll go make them in a bit."

Chen Lin and the others now knew that Yang Qi was very serious when it came to food.

Yang Qi didn't worry about the last portion of fish on the deck and continued to pilot the explorer to circle the area until he encountered a sizable school of fish before lowering the Trawling net.

When the second net was hauled up and they saw the bulging cod-end, everyone was filled with anticipation, hoping for high-quality goods inside.

This time, Bai Xue stepped forward to untie the net. With a forceful pull from her, a glistening white mass of figures poured out of the cod-end, and everyone immediately cheered.

"Hahaha, it's Horsehead Fish!"

Wang Jinxi picked up a fish, examined it, and said.

The so-called Horsehead Fish has the scientific name Silver Tilefish, and is also known as Wadao Fish or Japanese Tilefish.

The upper jaw of the fish's head is bald, making the entire head look square. The body is laterally compressed, with a deep red back and a light red belly.

If one wasn't paying close attention, it looked a bit like a Parrotfish at first glance.

"This stuff is delicious; it has garlic-clove-like meat!"

Wang Jinxi grinned and laughed loudly.

This type of fish generally doesn't grow very large, with the biggest being around two jin. Almost all the fish hauled up in this net were about one jin, which was the best specification.

The price of ordinary Horsehead Fish isn't actually high, about thirty yuan per jin, but for any seafood, large sizes are much more expensive.

For a single Horsehead Fish weighing over one jin, the price reaches 8 to 10 yuan per jin.

"Everyone, put in some effort and sort them into two specifications. Separate those over one jin!"

Wang Jinxi instructed everyone.

Horsehead Fish has tender, flaky meat with few bones. By marinating it to remove any fishy smell and using appropriate cooking methods like pan-searing, steaming, or braising, one can make delicious dishes.

"Chen Gang, don't worry about this for now; go make lunch! Use some of this Horsehead Fish for steaming and braising so everyone can see which way tastes better!"

Yang Qi instructed.

"This... Yang Qi, there are still quite a few Miscellaneous Fish left."

Wang Jinxi meant that there were still some Miscellaneous Fish that wouldn't sell for much; if they were to eat, they could eat those instead!

"Hahaha, A Xi, why do we earn money? It's true it's for the old and young at home, but we can't be overly harsh on ourselves."

"Besides, how much can we actually eat ourselves? It's just to have a taste."

Yang Qi said with a smile.

Seeing that he couldn't persuade Yang Qi, Wang Jinxi shut his mouth and said no more.

By the time everyone had sorted out the Horsehead Fish on the deck and sent them along with the Miscellaneous Fish to the Freezer Hold...

The kitchen had already finished cooking, so there was nothing left to do but eat!

A worker's soul is in their food, after all!

The explorer was different from the previous setting sail; because it carried out Trawling operations and had a large enough Freezer Hold, it completely won by volume.

No matter how worthless the catch was, as long as it reached a certain volume, the harvest was very impressive.

Those large fishing boats that go for ocean fishing can have a harvest of over ten million yuan even if they return fully loaded with Sardines.

For lunch, besides the beef, mutton, and vegetables brought from home, there was steamed Horsehead Fish and braised Horsehead Fish.

Chen Gang also killed some Miscellaneous Fish to make fish porridge and cooked a large pot of rice.

Actually, fish porridge still has a bit of a fishy smell; Yang Qi wasn't used to it at first, but once he was, he could taste a sweet and savory flavor that was very delicious.

Although Miscellaneous Fish porridge couldn't compare to the taste of Grouper, the fact that it was made from fresh Miscellaneous Fish made the resulting porridge very tasty.

After everyone finished lunch, Yang Qi decided to head back to the lagoon to collect the Gillnets and Longline Fishing gear.

As expected, both yielded a bumper harvest, and most of them were high-quality goods. The most common were Wrasse and three-knife fish.

Over the next two days, the explorer cruised around the Zhongsha Atoll, collecting the Gillnets, Longline Fishing gear, and crab traps twice a day, each time resulting in a bumper harvest.

The rest of the time was spent either diving for catch in the lagoon or tracking Tuna and Sailfish on the outskirts of the atoll.

Or they would look for schools of fish on the outskirts to perform Trawling operations.

Although they didn't encounter any large schools over these two days, the daily tracking of Tuna, combined with the yields from diving, Gillnets, Longline Fishing, and so on...

Overall, it was a very fruitful harvest.

Another two days passed quickly, and Yang Qi piloted the explorer away from the Zhongsha Islands.

They headed toward the southern sea area.

The sea area between the south of Zhongsha Atoll and the Twin Islets of the Nansha Islands is the deepest part of the South China Sea, with an average water depth of 5,559 meters.

The explorer did not stop again in this stretch of water, only encountering two medium-sized schools of fish.

Under Yang Qi's direction, they used Trawling to haul in two nets. One was a school of Skipjack Tuna, and after some maneuvering, they brought up over four thousand jin of Skipjack Tuna. Even though they were cheap, it was still a harvest of over a hundred thousand yuan.

In this abyssal sea area, and since the explorer didn't stop, no one used their rods to fish. Instead, Ding Kuan and Chen Lin were Trolling from the aft deck and caught a Spanish Mackerel weighing over a hundred jin.

The two of them shouted with excitement, so much so that they alerted everyone on the ship. Except for Bai Xue, who was currently piloting the boat, everyone ran out to watch.

Everyone looked at the Big Bend in the rod in Ding Kuan's hands and asked:

"Is it really a large Spanish Mackerel?"

"Yeah! When it jumped out just now, I saw its body—it's definitely a large Spanish Mackerel! It feels like it's over a hundred jin!"

Chen Lin explained from the side.