A fresh start

He had to start from scratch. First, he learned how to induce spawning, inseminate fish eggs and hatch fries at local freshwater fish farms, while studying books about the artificial propagation of saltwater fish. Meanwhile, he surveyed the spawning grounds in Sandu Bay to study the behavior of the fish.

With 10,000 yuan allocated by the provincial fishery department, the Large Yellow Croaker Artificial Propagation Project was officially launched in 1985.

In a spawning induction experiment on May 9, 1987, more than 100 large yellow croaker fries hatched from 20 adult fish caught in the wild.

But experts and fishermen did not envisage great prospects for the artificially preserved species because the fish grew slowly and so were not suitable for commercial farming. The project was shut down, and once again Liu was pushed into a corner.

Despite scant research funding and doubts expressed by other experts, Liu borrowed money from friends and established an aquaculture technology extension lab to study farming methods for large yellow croakers.

"We lived and worked on an old boat bought from a local fisherman because we could not afford a brick-and-mortar house. We used bamboo canes as makeshift water pipes to save money," Liu said.

Despite those issues, by 1995, the team had solved the problem of slow growth and developed the whole process of cage farming, which laid the foundations for mass commercial farming of the fish. Liu immediately set out to promote cage farming of large yellow croakers.