Commercial Gulf Shrimp Season Opens July 15

July 13, 2026

TEXAS COAST — The Gulf of America commercial shrimp season for state and federal waters will reopen 30 minutes after sunset on July 15.

The Texas Parks and Wildlife Department’s (TPWD) Coastal Fisheries Division uses data collected during routine bag seines and trawl sampling in June to determine a reopening date for the commercial shrimp season that best maximizes benefits to the shrimp resources and industry.

Bag seine sampling targets juvenile shrimp by pulling a net along the shoreline; whereas bay trawls target subadults by towing a net behind a boat in the open bay. Gulf trawl sampling targets adult shrimp and is done by deploying a net in the nearshore Gulf within 15 nautical miles of each of the five major Gulf passes – Sabine, Galveston, Matagorda, Aransas and Brazos Santiago – offshore to the edge of the Texas Territorial Sea.

The annual Gulf shrimp opening date is determined from June bag seine catch rates, June Bay trawl catch rates and lengths, June Gulf trawl catch rates and lengths and periods of maximum outgoing tides. Gulf trawl catch rates are an indicator of subadult and adult shrimp that have come from the bays and are migrating into deeper offshore water. Bag seine catch rates are an indication of any late recruits still residing in the bays that will be emigrating later in the season. Growth calculated from June Bay and Gulf trawl data is used to predict when shrimp will reach a target size of four inches (112 mm), and to predict peak abundance.

These measures, along with other management actions, have and continue to ensure the protection of the shrimp resource in Texas coastal waters.

Federal waters, from nine to 200 nautical miles offshore, will open at the same time as state waters. The National Marine Fisheries Service chose to adopt rules compatible with those adopted by Texas.