Shrimp Trap

https://primitivetechnology.wordpress.com/2016/11/04/shrimp-trap/

by nikolay • 10 years ago

166 57 10 years ago

primitivetechnology.wordpress.com

sdrothrock• 10 years ago

For anyone curious about this who didn't want to watch the video, the trap consists of:

1. A large woven cone

2. A smaller woven cone without a tip

The smaller cone is placed in the larger one; shrimp swim into the small cone to explore, but then get caught in the space between the two cones when they try to get out (presumably because it's difficult to find the single entrance).

He mentions that the only skill necessary is basketweaving -- I wonder if it would be possible to carve something similar (two interlocking geometric shapes) or if the trap being woven is essential to its function, for example, for allowing flowing water in to entice shrimp.

One of the parts that stood out for me was

In practice, a long stretch of creek might have several traps collecting food each day without any effort on the part of the fisherman.

If he were to go whole hog long-term, shrimp traps would free up his time for doing other crafts in ways that spear fishing or actively hunting wouldn't, though I suppose the local yield of shrimp would factor into that (whether he could collect enough calories consistently to fund his other efforts).

iowahansen• 10 years ago

100 grams of shrimp are roughly 100 calories. Let's generously assume that one shrimp from the video yields 200 grams of meat. So he would need to continuously catch 10 shrimp a day to satisfy a 2000 calorie diet. Seems to me that the shrimp population of this stream in the video would be exhausted pretty quickly and he would need to move elsewhere to continue hitting his calorie goals.

Given that we are surrounded by an incredible amount of high-calorie food (100g of a Snicker's bar provide 488 calories), it is easy to forget how difficult it is to source calories in the wild.

sgt101• 10 years ago

He had some yams with it, as well! But yes, I think the big gain here is protein, two shrimp a day in the diet of a family with five members would be a huge boost vs. hit and miss hunting / gathering.

Someone• 10 years ago

River shrimps are very common. It wouldn't surprise me if that creek held a thousand of those shrimps. Taking out 1% every day may actually be sustainable, as it takes out grown shrimps that otherwise would eat smaller shrimps.

And that's to survive on shrimp alone. It would be foolish to try that, not only because it wouldn't be a good diet, but also because putting all your eggs in one basket definitely isn't a good idea if your live depends on it.

And of, course, he may catch other edible animals, too, such as eels (this kind of trap is still commonly used in commercial eel fishing in Western Europe; if I had such a trap, I would consider putting a dead shrimp or other meat in such a trap to attract eels)

CydeWeys• 10 years ago

You're off by a factor of over 20. A reasonable ballpark estimate for the total mass of a shrimp is 10g. The amount of usable meat is less (though in a survival scenario you would eat the whole thing, head included). Hell, the average meat yield from a standard size blue crab is only around 60g.

You would need to eat netfulls of shrimp per day to meet caloric requirements, not just ten! Anecdotally, I can toss back dozens of appetizer shrimp and still be hungry for a main course.

joshvm• 10 years ago

I wonder if it would be possible to carve something similar (two interlocking geometric shapes) or if the trap being woven is essential to its function, for example, for allowing flowing water in to entice shrimp.

Yes.

Some traps work by allowing water to flow through, e.g. you can dam a stream and have water flow only through your trap. Or you can make solid bottle traps that fish explore and get trapped in.

mrkgnao3• 10 years ago

I humanely killed the shrimp using the splitting method which destroys the central nervous system (boiling alive is more painful).

How do we know this?

kierenj• 10 years ago

Sounds intuitive to me - trigger all pain receptors in the animal, or cut off the ability to feel pain, which is more painful?

mrkgnao3• 10 years ago

I agree, but I'm curious if there is a way to tell "for sure".

vvdcect• 10 years ago

The best way to kill seafood in general would be to use an anesthetic then gut/puncture its nervous system. Clove oil would be the best example of this, check dave arnold's post out http://www.cookingissues.com/index.html%3Fp=5731.html and a good method for fish would be killing it using the ikejime method https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ikejime .

muad2• 10 years ago

Yeah I would rather not drug my food.

alva• 10 years ago

The PrimitiveTechnology videos are such an incredible example of the wonders the internet provides. Here you have a guy making such interesting, engrossing videos, uploaded for free and accessible to all. The series is worthy of being on the BBC.

I wonder if there are any companies who spot this sort of content with the aim of getting in on tv screens.

m0nty2• 10 years ago

The series is worthy of being on the BBC

I think much youtube content is better than the output of the BBC, which shows an unfortunate tendency to "jazz up" its shows to make them more "accessible" and "fun". If Primitive Technology were on the BBC, he wouldn't be allowed to do everything without talking (he rarely makes eye-contact with the camera, even). There would probably be a "panel of experts" to discuss or direct the course of events, and they would introduce some competitive element, so several people would be working against each other to produce the best shrimp trap.

The same thing goes for other channels like Matthias Wandel, Paul Sellers, Alain Vaillancourt, Marius Hornberger, Louis Sauzedde and Chris on Clickspring. These are excellent channels, I would recommend all of them if you are into making things with your hands. But they could never exist on mainstream TV, and if they did, they would be stripped of their charm and value to make them more commercial. So youtube > regular TV, imo.

dogma1138• 10 years ago

If some light Christian libertarianism doesn't bother you also check wranglerstar.

And AvE needs to be on this list of nothing than for the comic relief FYF!!!

rawnlq• 10 years ago

I am pretty sure if you like primitive tech you would love the historical documentaries BBC did on this subject.

Primitive tech's presentation and focus on one technique per video is nice. But for comprehensiveness, you can't beat reenacting the 15th-16th century by living on a farm for a year like what BBC did in "Tales from the Green Valley", "Tudor Monastery Farms", and related series.

A lot of the exact techniques primitive tech covered is also covered by those series:

Fish traps: https://youtu.be/ZIbhoR1GBuI?t=302

Wattle and daub wall: https://youtu.be/Qn1h8DOQGEQ?t=589

Building roofs: https://youtu.be/jgjFsR-c0-Q?t=558

Smelting lead ores: https://youtu.be/ZIbhoR1GBuI?t=837

etc etc

akhatri_aus• 10 years ago

Are you serious? The BBC is full of exceptional quality content. Planet Earth II is out sometime now just as an example of what is on there.

logingone• 10 years ago

This makes me think of the Brian Cox wonder-tone. Everything he says has a tone of wonder so thick that I can't watch his documentaries. Presumably it works for another audience.

ben_utzer• 10 years ago

For the lazy

https://www.youtube.com/user/Matthiaswandel

https://www.youtube.com/user/PaulSellersWoodwork

https://www.youtube.com/user/lgosseuxdbois

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCn7lavsPdVGV0qmEEBT6NyA

https://www.youtube.com/user/TipsfromaShipWright

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCworsKCR-Sx6R6-BnIjS2MA

All woodworkers apart for the last one.

internaut2• 10 years ago

For some reason this style reminds me of

Kenneth Clarke's Civilization. James Burke's Connections. Carl Sagan's Cosmos.

Show and tell.

That kind of television isn't made anymore. I say that as a millennial. If you have a niche interest in architecture or wildlife you can still find it today but not in popular television series. When I watch modern popular productions I find I can retain almost no information about them. I don't think it is me, I think it is them.

Lxr• 10 years ago

Can anyone actually start a fire that easily without chemicals?

krastanov• 10 years ago

It is not that easy, but yes. The fluffy dry mass (the tinder) is very important - it is the thing that catches fire at low temperature. See his pump drill video for some of the pain points.

robtaylor• 10 years ago

On reddit overnight there were tens of posts on this from separate users, now I see this on here.

Is this common / natural or is there some PR at work?

DanBC• 10 years ago

It's natural. Many people on HN enjoy the videos and blogs, so it's natural that they post links.

keeganjw• 10 years ago

Yes, yes, yes! I didn't know he had a blog. I've only seen his Youtube channel. Time to take a deep dive into his written material.

koolba• 10 years ago

This guy is seriously amazing. I've spent hours watching every one of his videos and I think I ran out of, "WTF?"s by the time I was done.

yandrypozo• 10 years ago

This guy is a perfect hacker of primitive technologies. I'm a big fan of his videos, all of them! I wish I could find more of those.

Shrimp Trap

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