Tiger Prawn

The boys in white lab coats over at CSIRO and in the prawn industry have managed to breed and improve upon Black Tiger Prawn, and they are producing bumper crops in aquaculture farms and have been winning awards.

These prawns are so good in fact, that they have even won FIVE gold medals at the Sydney Royal Easter Show for the past two years running, including “Champion of Show” which happens to be the most decorated award possible.

The boys in white over at CSIRO’s Food Futures Flagship have tweaked the Black Tiger Prawn DNA, to make sure that the breeding program they have running captures the elite of the group and boost performance of their stocks every breeding season.

For the past several years, about fifty percent of all the prawns sold in Australia were imported from other countries such as Vietnam and China, so developing a local prawn which breeds in captivity is an extraordinary gain for both the local prawn industry and hungry consumers wanting to buy local seafood.

Dr. Nigel Preston, leader of the CSIRO Food Futures Flagship, had this to say about this exquisite prawn. “The new prawn’s yield has exceeded all our expectations. The average industry productivity for farmed prawns is only five tones per hectare, so this year’s average yield of 17.5 tones per hectare is a major leap forward, these huge yields can be replicated year after year which means consistent supply of a reliable and high quality product – all vital factors for the long-term growth and prosperity of the Australian prawn farming industry.”

Aquaculture has yielded approximately 17.5 tones per hectare, more than double the average production in the industry, all thanks to Dr. Preston’s super prawn. Several of the ponds produced 20 tones per hectare, and one even produced a record breaking yield of 24.2 tones per hectare.

Theorists say that if the rest of the Australian Black Tiger Prawn industry followed suit, and adopted this new DNA tweaking technology, Australia’s production could more than double, adding a $120 million boost to the annual value of the industry by the year 2020.

Mr. Nick Moore, general manager of Gold Coast Marine Aquaculture, had this to say about this revolutionary new prawn, and about Dr. Preston’s work.. “Thanks to outstanding work by the staff here, aided by close collaboration with our partners at CSIRO, we have just finished a prawn breeding season that can only be described as staggering, not only have we achieved national and international yield records with no reduction in quality or taste, these prawns are grown in a specially designed, environmentally sustainable production system. This production system and the new breeds have produced a perfect prawn with beautifully textured meat, rich color, robust size and a great taste. The awards (Sydney Royal Easter Show) are professionally judged on many criteria including size, color, taste and texture, so the results speak for themselves.”

With predictable output, and supped up prawn.. Australia is set to make its mark on the prawn industry.