Not very long ago, shrimp was plebeian grub. Oldtimers in the south still remember that it was but small courtesy for toddy sellers to give half-a-dozen shrimps free with a bottle of the best. Impoverished local labourers still enjoy the right to fish shrimp left over in any farm after the vernal equinox (March 21), following a traditional festival called kattukalakkal.

Clad typically in a lungi and towel, old Natesan of Ilankunnappuzha village reminisces, "Here we have been rearing shrimp for generations. The yield is usually about 200 kg/ha/ crop." He is happy with his sustained annual profit of Rs 2 lakh from his 10 acres.

In Vypeen and the nearby islets, farmers cultivate salinity-resistant paddy and rear shrimp in alternate cycles. The local paddy variety called pokkali can stand water salinity level up to 8 ppt (parts per thousand). The brackish water is let into the farm at high tide. The tidal effect ensures a partial recycling of the ponds regularly.

Babu Augustine, a textile merchant who started farming recently, is markedly different in attire and ambition from Natesan. He has a Tata Sierra saloon, wears terrycot clothes and a goldplated watch. He invested Rs 1.5 lakhs in modified-extensive shrimp farming in 4.5 ha of small, brackish water canals amidst a coconut grove. "I expect a yield of 2 tonnes," he says confidently.

The verdant Vypeen island near Cochin, the favoured spot for traditional shrimp farming, is in transition towards scientific pisciculture. In the backyard shrimp hatchery set up by Thomas 4 months ago, more than half a million shrimp seeds packed in polypacks await transportation to the disease-hit east coast.

The 2 hatcheries that came up in Vypeen alone have the capacity to produce 40 million seeds in a single cycle, in up to 8 runs a year. Two more hatcheries are coming up. In the last 3 years at least 50 modified extensive farms, including govenrnment-run ones, and a semi-intensive farm, have come up in Vypeen and area, a conglomerate of villages between brackish water canals, ponds and fields.

A Laxminarayana, officer in-charge of the ciba research centre in nearby Narakkal says, "In Vypeen, the possibilities and potentials are tremendous. With a little care, a pokkali farm can fetch 1 t/ha. I would advise only modified-intensive culture (1.5 to 2 t/ha/crop) in Kerala."

Says Augustine; "Laxminarayana advised me to first put in 50,000 tiger shrimps. But I got some white shrimps cheap and I added 100,000 of them as well." It's back to the same story of overkill by avarice.