Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 9.djvu/264

254 FISHERIES [ENGLISH. pilchards, but sprats and various other fish are occasionally taken by them. The particular fishery with which this net is most commonly associated is that for pilchards at St Stives Ives, on the north coast of Cornwall, where scans are pilchard k e pt in readiness for working on a very large scale, fishery. -p or a j on g coursc of years St Ives Bay has been more or less visited by shoals of pilchards, generally during the months of October and November. These fish are found in abundance off the south-west of Ireland rather earlier in the year, and it appears as if the shoals were returning towards the Bay of Biscay, when they arrive on the north coast of Cornwall in October, In their course southwards some of them enter St Ives Bay and sweep around it, and if, in doing so, they come within a certain range of part of the shore, the seans are brought into play, and large captures of fish may be made. The seaning ground is on the western side of the bay, and extends southwards for nearly three miles from the bar. It is divided into six stations or "stems," by marks or bound aries on the land, in positions fixed by a local Act. 1 These stems have each a name, and no fishing boats besides those employed in the sean fishery are allowed to fish or anchor within a certain distance of the stems between an hour before sunrise and the same period after sunset from the 25th of July to the 25th of December; and any passing boats must keep near the shore. Under favourable circum stances the fishery is likely to be so valuable and of such general advantage to the town that the Act of Parliament regulating the proceedings is strictly carried out with the approval of all concerned. For this reason also no seans below a certain size are allowed to be used, so that the danger of disturbing a large body of fish, and perhaps frightening them into deep water without having secured a good haul, may be as much as possible avoided. The smallest sean of legal size at St Ives is 160 fathoms along the cork-rope, with a depth of 8 fathoms at the middle or bunt and 6 fathoms at the ends or wings. Some of the seans are as much as 200 fathoms long, and the mesh in all is three-quarters of an inch square throughout the net. The object is not to mesh the fish as in a drift-net, but to inclose them. What we have described is the sean proper, but there is another of smaller size and different proportions which also takes part in the fishery. This is called a tuck- 8ean, and is only 70 to 80 fathoms long, but it is 8 fathoms at the wings and 10 fathoms in the middle or bunt. Besides these there are other nets called stop-nets, which are practically only additions which can be made to the principal sean, and which are so used when the sean is being worked. As there are about 250 seans at St Ives, and only six stations in which they can be used, some arrangement is necessary to prevent confusion and inter ference, and this and other details are the subject of special regulations. The seans are all registered, and many of them belong to companies. Several boats are employed when a sean is to be shot. The largest, called the sean-boat, is about 32 feet on keel, with plenty of room for carry ing the net; she has six men for rowing and two for shoot ing the sean. Two tow-boats about 24 feet long, and each carrying a stop-net, with a crew of six men, make up the working party; but besides these there is a small boat called the " volyer " or " lurker," from which the master seaner directs all the proceedings. The position of the shoals of fish is pointed out by men called " huers," who are selected from the sharpest and cleverest of the fisher men. There are generally two of them on the hill above each station, and when they see the shoals of fish, looking like the shadow of a cloud on the water, they signal with a large white canvas ball to the boats waiting below in the stations. These men remain on duty for three hours at 1 -1 and 5 Viet. c. 57. a time, and receive .3 a month, and one hogshead out of every hundred hogsheads of fish landed. When the shoal has come within a convenient distance of one of the sta tions, the boats containing the sean and stop-scan, which have been previously joined together, commence shooting the nets at the same time, the larger net being thrown out in a direction parallel with the shore, while the stop-sean is shot in front of the shoal as the boat is rowed towards the land. The two boats ultimately turn towards each other, and gradually bring the ends of the nets together, thus cut ting off and surrounding as many fish as they can. Tho second stop-net is joined to the first if there is a probability of its being wanted. The nets are then fastened together at the point of meeting, and the circle gradually contracted until all the fish are inclosed by the single large sean. The ends being securely joined and the stop-nets taken away, the circle of netting with the inclosed pilchards is slowly hauled towards the shore, into some quiet place as much as possible out of the run of the tide, till the weighted foot of the net touches the bottom, and there it is safely moored. The fish cannot now escape, and if the haul be a large one several days may elapse before they are all taken out. " Tucking" the fish is the next operation, and this is per formed with the tuck-sean, which we described as being very deep in the middle. It is shot in the ordinary way with one boat, but inside the other sean, and as it is hauled in, the foot of the bunt is raised so as to bring the fish to the surface, whence they are dipped out in large baskets and put into attendant boats to be carried on shore. This is of course the exciting moment of the day, and all the town is astir, and taking part in the general rejoicing. Landing and carrying the fish to the curing houses is done by men termed " blowsers," who are paid in proportion to the catch of fish. The seanmen receive certain wages in money and a share of the fish, and every household docs a little curing on its own account. The great bulk of the fish, however, goes into the houses of the large curers, who are generally the proprietors of the seans. "Women are employed in tlic curing, which consists in packing Pilchard the pilchards in alternate layers of coarse salt and fish on the curing, stone floor of the curing house, until the "bulk," as it is called, has reached a height of five or six feet. The fish remain hens a month, and the oil and brine draining from the mass are carried oiF by gutters in the floor to a cistern. When the fish have been sufficiently salted they are washed and packed with the heads out wards in hogsheads, and a " rose " of fish in the middle to keep the level. Gradual pressure is now applied on top of the fish, until the contents of the cask have been reduced one-third in bulk, and a large quantity of oil squeezed out ; this escapes through the sides of the hogshead, the hoops not being at first very tightly driven. The cask is filled up three times before the pressing is finished, and then, after eight or nine days, the hogshead of fish should weigh four hundredweight gross. The average number of fish in each hogs head is 2500, and sometimes as many as 1000 hogsheads have been taken at one haul of the sean The largest single catch recorded at St Ives was 5500 hogsheads actually landed, and on that occasion great numbers of fish were lost besides. The fluctuation in the scan- pilchard fishery at St Ives is very great from year to year ; and it would appear remarkable, if the success of the fishery did not almost entirely depend on whether or not the shoals came into that part of the bay where alone the seans can be used. The St Ives sean- fishery has been unsuccessful for the last four years, less than 10,000 hogsheads having been cured in each of those periods ; but in the "Pilchard Circular" issued by Messrs G. C. Fox & Co. of Falmouth, giving an account of the fishery season of 1877, it is said that " considerable bodies of fish visited the coast, but did not come into the stems where seines might have inclosed them." " The pil- " It is difficult to suggest any satisfactory explanation of the fact that, though large shoals of pilchards are every year observed passing the north coast of Cornwall, it is only in particular years that any great numbers of these fish enter St Ives Bay and come within reach of the seaners. It might seem that the streams, containing drainage from mining works, which fall into the bay, would pollute the water, and tend to turn back the fish, but there is much less mining in the neighbourhood now than formerly. The fishermen s idea that the state and direction of the tide, when a shoal of fish is near the entrance to the bay, affect the course of the shoals appears more plausible, for it must