People on the outskirts of Thua Thien Hue have started to harvest sea cucumbers or holothurian to sell to Chinese traders.
Searching for sea cucumbers in Lang Co Bay
Although the holothurian in Lang Co Bay in Thua Thien Hue has high nutritional and economic value, they are not well-known to many local people in Lang Co Bay, but the holothurian is a familiar species to people in Binh Dinh Province.
When the tide goes out, 20-30 people, all from Binh Dinh Province, search for the sea creature along the beach from 4 to 7pm.
The holothurian has a leathery skin and a 40-50cm elongated body. They mostly live under the mud near the sea at Lang Co Bay. An avarage hunter can catch 3-4 kilogrammes of holothurian in the three hours, while an experienced hunter can catch over 6 kilogrammes.
80-100 kilograms of holothurian are packed into frozen boxes each day to transport back to Binh Dinh at night, or they are processed and dried before transportation. The dried holothurian are mostly exported to China at a price of VND1-1.3 million (USD48-62) per kilogramme.
The hunt starts from 4 pm
Holothurian live in sand holes
Water flows from the hole
A holothurian
Lang Co Bay has many holothurian
Results after an hour of harvesting
