PERU 



These fish are not only chased with power boats but are 

 sailed down, and it is some sight to see. They have no 

 kegs and sometimes attempt to throw two harpoons into the 

 fish. On two different occasions in the last three years off 

 Cabo Blanco this httle fleet of twenty-one sailing craft and 

 some eight or nine power boats has harpooned over 300 

 swordfish in a single day. They tend the fish from their balsa 

 rafts. 



They now get $20.00 apiece for each swordfish or espada, 

 no matter what the size, and some 300 soles for every black 

 marlin. A 1500-pound broadbill swordfish was brought in to 

 Paita in 1941 and the largest I know harpooned commercially 

 at Cabo Blanco was a 1040-pounder. Mike Lerner claims he 

 saw the biggest swordfish he ever encountered off Cabo 

 Blanco and he has fished for them more than any other man. 

 He firmly beheves that a broadbill weighing over 1200 

 pounds will be brought in to this port. 



The largest fish I ever heard of was harpooned off Cabo 

 Blanco— a 2250-pound black marUn— so it should not be too 

 long before the record attains at least 1 800 pounds. I predicted 

 1400 pounds for 1953 and it's already 1560. 



Swordfish were shipped to the States from these waters all 

 through the war and still find a market there. Thus many of 

 the inhabitants have been provided with a liveUhood, thanks 

 to Lerner. 



Dmring his visit to Cabo Blanco, Lerner was afforded con- 

 siderable amusement by the unusually large squid off the 

 Peruvian coast. He had fun fishing them at night, taking 

 many weighing up to 150 pounds with clusters of eight gang 

 hooks which were devised after some experimentation. He 



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