Seafood connoisseurs race to snatch up Foailuga palolo
The palolo harvest at Foailuga on Monday morning was bounteous.
Photo: Supplied
Seafood connoisseurs in Upolu were racing Monday morning to get their hands on fresh palolo harvested in Foailuga, Savai’i but they will have to wait one more day for it to arrive via ferry from the big island.
Tele Perenese, 24, said her phone was ringing off the hook Monday morning after her palolo post was published on “Sell Your Stuff in Samoa”, a public Facebook group where locals sell things.
Mrs. Perenese, who lives in Sataoa with her husband, traveled from Upolu to her village in Savai’i on the 3 p.m. Sunday afternoon ferry.
“I like to fish for it but I don’t eat it,” she told EyeSpy Radio during a phone interview.
“It’s great because it’s fast money. We were in the water for a short while fishing for the palolo and now we are going to make some money.”
Foailuga, in the western part of the Palauli district was a hotspot for palolo hunters, Mrs. Perenese said.
Tourists and locals alike from Neiafu, Sapapalii and Samata, flocked to Foailuga’s coast to fish for the rare wormy delicacy that rises seven days after the full moon in the months of October and November.
“Oh my! There were so many people here from different villages here in Foailuga, Neiafu and some people came from Sapapali’i,” said Mrs. Perenese.
“There were a lot of visitors who were out here fishing for palolo too. There were so many people who are not from my village but they were out here fishing with us. I really don’t know where a lot of the people came from.”
She set out to fish with her husband and two siblings, a brother and a sister plus their spouses.
“It was me and my husband, my brother and his wife and my sister and her husband,” said Mrs. Perenese.
Palolo Season.
Photo: Supplied
“We went out early this morning after 4:30, at about 5 a.m. We came back about 7 a.m. We were not in the water for long.”
They spent less than three hours in the water. Together with her husband, they returned with enough palolo to fetch them about $1,500.
“We didn’t use buckets. We scooped it straight from the ocean into pans and into the containers and jars,” said Mrs. Perenese.
“We had two [rectangular] containers, three big mayonnaise jars and two small mayonnaise jars. We only have one container and one big jar left.”
By 9 a.m. Monday, most of their catch was placed on reserve by customers located on Upolu.The container is selling for $600, the big jar for $350 and the small jar for $100.
Seafood lovers were still inquiring on her post later in the day on the “Sell Your Stuff in Samoa” Facebook group.
The Foailuga deal looks a lot sweeter than the $50 per bundle (ofu palolo) sold in the town area. The amount of palolo found in the bundle is about a quarter of what’s in Mrs. Perenese’s $100 jar.
“There are so many people who have called about the palolo but the thing is they are all on Upolu,” said Mrs. Perenese.
“They have my number now so they will call me tomorrow for the location to pick up their palolo.”
Family members have called her from Upolu to say they found nothing during their palolo hunt in Upolu.
“It looks like there wasn’t much Apia. My family in Apia called and said they had nothing,” Mrs. Perenese said.
“We live in Apia and we traveled here from Apia. We came here to fish for palolo.”
She returns to Upolu with her husband on Tuesday.
“We return to Apia tomorrow,” Mrs. Perenese said.
“We came on the ferry by car and we’ll be meeting our customers at the fish market.”
Palolo lovers who missed out can look forward to next month’s rising.
The 17 October palolo rising occurred on the dates as predicted last month by experts at the Samoa Meteorological Service.
The predicted dates are based on traditional Samoan knowledge that says the first rising of the palolo occurs seven days after October’s full moon.
The full moon was on 10 October so that put the rising on Sunday, 16 October and Monday, 17 October.
“From the night of the full moon in October and November, you count seven days so you check the palolo on the sixth and seventh days,” the weather expert explained.
“The full moon for October is on the tenth of October…so it’s either the sixteenth of the seventeenth of October.”
The second rising is predicted to take place on Tuesday, 15 November and Wednesday, 16 November.
Of course, whether the November swarming will be as great as October’s or better is always the gamble that palolo hunters take.