"We produce 200,000 tons of large yellow croaker every year, while the production of the salmon industry stands at 2 million tons," Liu said. "There is still a lot of room for our fish in terms of technical innovation and market expansion."

Liu has another dream. He is pushing to revive China's wild yellow croaker stocks by persuading local governments and aquaculture companies to release fry into the sea.

"Preserving the genetic resources is just the beginning. I do not want to brag about it," Liu said. "The ultimate goal is to restore stocks in the wild."

He is writing a book, preliminarily called A Brief History of Fishing and Farming the Large Yellow Croaker, which details his life taking care of the fish.

Now, he is looking for a happy ending for his book.