Kitty Jordan didn't have high hopes for the shrimp season because she knew what the winter wrought.
It was extra cold. It was especially mean. For 31 days, starting in mid-December, water temperatures were at or below 47 degrees, cold enough to kill the white shrimp. And it did.
She knew the harsh winter was the reason the commercial shrimp trawling season, which usually opens in late May or early June, was delayed until June 22. The opening date has not been this late since 2001, which was preceded by a similar chilly winter, said Brett Witt, a S.C. Department of Natural Resources spokesman based in Columbia.
Jordan, who works with her family at Stormy Seas Seafood Market in Georgetown, simply didn't have high hopes.
She is glad she was wrong.
"The season has really been good," Jordan said. "We were figuring it wasn't going to be anything because of the delay, but the brownies [brown shrimp] we have are really good. We sell most of them."
Despite Mother Nature disrupting the season, seafood markets are experiencing brisk sales from local brown shrimp being caught by shrimpers.
At Mr. Fish Seafood Market & Fish Market in Myrtle Beach, Holland Grayson, market manager, recently sold 20 pounds of local shrimp within two hours.
"People are coming in, and they want the local stuff," Grayson said. "They don't want the non-local stuff."
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