564 FISHING NETS, WITH SPECIAL REFERENCE TO THE OTTER-TRAWL. 



but the difficulties of a wasp which lias entered a room through a 

 slightly open window are very small in comparison with tliose of 

 a fish when it is once in the " heart " of the pound. 



These nets are only useful for the capture of inshore fish or fish 

 which enter rivers, but there are two forms of fixed nets, probably 

 derived from the " leader " of the pound-net, which are of great 

 importance in sea fishing. These are the gill-net and the trennmel. 

 In the former, as the name denotes, the fish are caught by the gills ; 

 in the latter they are entrapped in a bag or pocket of their own 

 making. 



Though gill-nets are extensively used in this country, it is mostly 

 in the form of drift-nets for fish swimming near the surface, such as 

 mackerel or herring. The net is made fast — at one end only — to the boat, 

 and boat and net drift together. Sometimes the head-line is sunk below 

 the surface by extra leads on the foot-rope when the fish are swimming 

 deep, and they frequently catch fish — for example, whiting — which keep 

 near the bottom as a rule. In one or two places these nets are moored 

 in fishing for herring, and quite within the last few years the old 

 method of sinking the net to the bottom has been revived on the 

 east coast of Scotland.* 



In the United States,f however, gill-nets are, as a v\i\e, fixed 7iets, and 

 only occasionally drift-nets. The enormous part they play in the 

 American fisheries may be judged from this, that each boat is said 

 to have an outfit of gill-nets which would extend twenty to thirty 

 miles, if set at one time. 



The trammelX is a compound net usually in three layers, of which 

 the two outer are of wide mesh stretched out taut, whilst the middle 

 layer is of very small mesh with plenty of slack. Consequently, if 

 a fish strike the net on either side it will pass through the first layer 

 and drive the second through the third, and thus becomes entrapped 

 in a pocket of its own making. These nets are employed on the south- 

 west coast of England and round the Channel Islands for the capture 

 of red mullet, though they catch all kinds of fish — soles, plaice, dories, 

 and even crabs and lobsters. Like the gill-net, the trammel is moored 

 upright to the bottom by means of lead on the foot-rope and corks on 

 the head-rope, and like it also is very useful on rough or rocky ground. 

 The advantage which the trammel has over the gill-net consists in its 



* The result of this is said to liave been a greatly increased catch, amongst other 

 fish, of haddock, on grounds which were supposed to have been cleaned out by the 

 trawlers. Gill-nets were formerly used also for the capture of crabs and lobsters on the 

 south coast of England. 



t Augur, Bull. U.S. Fish Commission, xiii., 1893, p. 381. 



X Wilcoeks, Tlie Sea Fisherman, London, 1875, p. 244 ; Holdsworth, Deep Sea Fishing 

 and Fishing Bouts, London, 1874, p. 175, 



