An unusually cold winter that decimated native shrimp has robbed the Carolinas of a spring delicacy.
Below-normal water temperatures killed virtually all the white shrimp that overwinter in South Carolina's estuaries, and N.C. officials also report dead crustaceans.
The cold heaped more trouble on Carolina shrimpers, whose numbers are also dwindling. Shrimpers are already being undercut by cheaper, farm-raised imports and, more recently, rising fuel costs.
S.C. fishermen who caught 1.3 million pounds of white shrimp last fall are now hauling up only handfuls, said Larry DeLancey, who oversees crustacean monitoring for the S.C. Department of Natural Resources.
"We haven't collected any white shrimp since January," he said.
Clean Catch Fish Market on Selwyn Avenue is offering fresh Florida shrimp as an alternative. But customers are grilling owner Bill Ryan daily about the whereabouts of the local catch.
"First of all, they want it fresh. There is a big taste difference," Ryan said. "Second of all, they want to support Carolina seafood."
For that, Charlotteans may have to wait awhile.
Brown shrimp, one of the three species netted in the Carolinas, are growing to catchable size, but the season isn't likely to open for a few more weeks.
"They keep saying two weeks, but they've been saying that for a while now," said David Meeks, whose Flying Fish Seafood & Co. makes a weekly run to Wilmington.
The business, which Meeks runs with his son Josh, sells Carolina seafood from a stand north of Davidson on Thursday and Friday afternoons, and at the Davidson Farmers Market on Saturday mornings. They've been getting by on white shrimp they froze last winter.
Federal waters off South Carolina will reopen to shrimping Tuesday, the South Atlantic Fishery Management Council said last week. State waters - within 3 miles of the coast - will reopen only when brown shrimp reach marketable size.
Most white shrimp are caught while young in the fall, followed by a spring catch of those that have spent the winter in the estuaries. The spring catch has benefited in recent years from mild winter weather. N.C. shrimpers hauled in 1.7 million pounds last year, compared to 1.3 million pounds in 2009.
But the species is at the northern end of its range in North Carolina, said Rich Carpenter of the N.C. Division of Marine Fisheries in Wilmington. They can't survive water temperatures below 46 degrees for more than a few days, and last winter dipped below that threshold.
"Anything left in the estuaries would be affected," he said.
DeLancey, the S.C. official, estimated that 99 percent of white shrimp there died. That means the fall harvest is also likely to be down, he said, but populations can quickly rebuild if wind and currents drive larvae northward from Georgia and Florida.
"Next winter will be the key," he said. "If we get some of those, they can build up pretty quickly."
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