The truth about the ponds....lets put this to rest...
courtesy of "seafood source" article
“I have a fair amount of experience over the years with this farm. I’ve bought shrimp from this farm, and I was part of a team that actually leased some of the farm at one point. So it's always been on my radar screen, and I knew someday, somebody was going to take the thing and make it work,” Sedacca told SeafoodSource. “The fact that I have experience with this farm, and that people like Adam and his group are friends of mine – I know they know what they're doing, they are experienced shrimp farmers, and it fits the model that I'm trying to work in, which is promoting American aquaculture.”
Thomas said the company hopes to soon begin stocking 500 acres of ponds at the farm with postlarvae developed onsite over the last several years in a hatchery built in 2019 and nursery facilities constructed in 2020. Once operational, Trans American is aiming for two annual harvests of one million pounds each of head-on shrimp, with a stocking density of 10 to 12 animals per square meter.
Once successful, there’s an additional 650 acres of ponds at the farm that require rehabilitation to be suitable for commercial aquaculture, and Thomas said his company plans to commence that work in 2024. By 2025, the plan is to add intensification technology including auto-feeders, auto-aerators, and other technology that can bring stocking densities to 20 to 30 animals per square meter.
Trans American doesn’t have plans to build out processing capabilities, as there are already a number of processing facilities in South Texas, including one 30 minutes from the farm. Thomas said he also sees an opportunity to sell fresh shrimp into the huge and hungry domestic market in Texas, via Austin, Texas-based Whole Foods and San Antonio, Texas-based HEB.
“I can sell [our total estimated production] to any of a number of distributors. I've had contacts who have said that they will buy everything we have up to two million pounds – that's been two independent distributors. So that gave us confidence to go full-bore on this project,” Thomas said. “With HEB specifically, you say it’s from Texas and they want it. I think they’ll buy pretty much all the farmed shrimp that they can get their hands from the state of Texas. With Whole Foods, it’s a step above in terms of quality, but that’s a potential opportunity for as well, because we use [Best Aquaculture Practices-certified] feed from Cargill and there's no live animal products in it.”
Thomas said Trans American will initially focus on larger-sized shrimp between 16-20 count and 26-30 count, where he and Sedacca said there is currently the best premium on domestic versus imported product. They said their prices typically sit between the average of the price of imported shrimp and the cost of wild-caught shrimp from the Gulf of Mexico.
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