GULF OF MEXICO: WESTERN FLORIDA. 549 



Boca Ceiga Bay, which, after leaving Tampa Bay, is the first point where fishing stations are 

 found. The fishermen here come from Key West and sell their fish to dealers in the Havana trade. 

 There are two stations, one at Turtle Crawl Point and the other at Pass a Goille. These are not 

 permanently occupied; they are visited only during the mullet season in the fall. They are 

 conducted in better style than those farther up the coast and the fish are much more neatly cured. 

 The fall mullet at Boca Ceiga are unusually large and fine, and are far superior to those at Crystal 

 River and vicinity or at Cedar Keys. 



The statistics relative to the fishing at the two above-named places, Turtle Crawl Point and 

 Pass a Goille, will be included with those for Key West. 



CLEARWATER HARBOR. Following the coast - northward, the next indentation of any 

 importance is Clearwater Harbor, which is a long, narrow sheet of water lying between a chain of 

 islands and the mainland. The Gulf, outside of this harbor, becomes shallower than at Tampa 

 Bay. Inside the harbor also the water is very shoal, the channel affording the only passage for 

 large boats. The islands forming the sea Imrrier are the only ones in the harbor, and these 

 are low and sandy, bearing a scrubby growth of palmetto and mangrove trees. The mainland 

 is probably one of the highest points on the whole southern coast of Florida. It rises quite 

 abruptly from the water's edge and is heavily wooded with pines, oaks, &c. The soil is good, and 

 a great part of the land along the shore, which is quite thickly peopled, is under cultivation. 



At the southern end of the harbor there is living a man named Kilgores, who is as much a 

 professional fisherman as any on the coast. He has a house and farm, and, being located at a 

 good point, is able to combine farming with fishing. In the mullet season he employs several men 

 to assist him in working his seines, salting, &c., and they do much better work than is done at any 

 of the fisheries immediately to the northward. Their nets and modes of fishing are the same as 

 at Crystal River and vicinity, but the fish are handled more carefully during the process of curing, 

 and are therefore far superior both to keep and eat. The fish are sold to the country people, 

 either kench-salted, at 3 cents apiece, or are put up in barrels with brine and sold at 86 a barrel. 

 In 1878 Mr. Kilgores put up 45 barrels of mullet. The salt used by him is procured from Tampa 

 or Cedar Keys ; he pays $2 or $2.50 a sack for it. 



ANCLOTE KEYS. The next fishing point is Auclote Keys. Behind the Keys is a favorite 

 resort for Key West smack fishermen, spongers, turtle and "salt- fishermen," and every year one or 

 two gangs of the last are stationed there. In 1879 there was a vessel from Appalachicola and one 

 from Key West fishing for mullet there, but they came and went with so little ceremony that it 

 would be difficult to learn much of their success. The Key West spongers have a series of sponge 

 crawls, some eight or ten, at the North Anclote Bay, and the harbor is much used by smack fisher- 

 men in bad weather. 



HOMOSASSA AND CHESSEHOWiSKA RIVERS On the Homosassa and the Chessehowiska 

 Rivers no fishing, except with a few cast-nets (and that by non-professional fishermen), is 

 done. At Bay Point a few fish are caught with cast-nets and an old seine, the total catch of both 

 cast-nets and seine probably amounting to 25 or 30 barrels in a season. These fish are sold to 

 farmers who come prepared to cure their own fish and sometimes also to catch them. The farmers 

 also buy from fishing boats or vessels that chance to pass by. 



CRYSTAL RIVEK FISHERY. Next in order comes the Crystal River fishery, situated on 

 Crystal River Bay. Here two and sometimes three seines are used. The object of this fishery is 

 to obtain a supply of fish for the country trade and for their own use, and the mode of carrying it 

 on is similar to that at Chambers's Mill, next to be described. The fish are cither carried up the 



