A slimy business in Middletown is growing in more ways than one.
Marine Bait Wholesale is actually a farm…an indoor farm to grow and export eels. We were there as workers packed 101 boxes with eels to be shipped to South Korea.
Farm owner, Bill Clayton, said his farm is also growing thanks to a nearly $50,000 grant from the state of Connecticut. The money will help with his plans to add dozens of tanks to a 7,000 square foot area, which will hold upwards of 35 tons of eels.
“I already got the customer-base that’s screaming for the product,” Clayton said. “It does not matter to me where it’s going because the gentleman pays me at my door, and I say thank you.”
Clayton estimated for now about 15% of his eels end up on dinner plates…the rest are sold as fishing bait and seed stock for other farms.