When haul seines were standard gear fishonnon froquontly "tested" 

 shallow vater areas vith cast nets to detarraine if shriiap vero present in 

 sufficient abundance tu Justify setting and hauling the seine. 



Haul Seines 



Haul seines were introduced about lb72 and by 18bO had become 

 the most important type of gear in the commercial shrimp fishery. Basi- 

 cally, a haul seine consists of netting with a stretched mesh of 1/2 to 

 1-1/2 inches rectangular in shape; it varies in length and depth, with 

 a lead line running along the bottom, and a cork or float line running 

 along the top. During the years haul seines were used there iias little 

 change in the overall design. As the fishery progressed and lo potior 

 boats came into general use, larger seines were used in the fishery. 



Originally the seines were made of half -inch stretched mash 

 netting and were up to 120 feet long and 10 feet deep. The smaller 

 seines could be handled by two men in a row boat. Gradually, however, 

 the net mesh was made larger and the seines increased in size, some 

 of them reaching l,bOO feet in length with l!| feet depth at the center, 

 graduated to about 7 feet at each end. With seines of this size pow- 

 ered boats VQve necessary and crews of as many as 20 man were required 

 to handle them. 



As long as shrimping V7as coniinod to shalloxj waters the boat 

 was run close to shore t?here one end of the net was dropped and held 

 by about tuilf of the cn-.n. The boat then laid out the not in a large 

 circle surrounding the shri-ap and returned to shore with the remainder 

 of the crow and the other end of the seine. The seine was then pulled 

 in . After the net had been hauled in uufficitntly for the catch to 

 be enclosed in a small area, the boat was brought alongside and the 

 shrimp brailed into it. During the heyday of seining operations various 

 seines ware designed for use in water as deep as 20 feet. As hiul 

 seines gradually gave \?ay to shrimp trawls, the seines roriiaining in 

 operation were rarely used in water more than 6 feet deep. 



Shrii-jp Trawls 



The slirimp travjl basically corresponds to the otter trawl 

 which was first introduced in the New England fislierles in the early 

 1900' s. CoDstructed along the same lines, differences are confined 

 almost eiitii-ely to size, weight, and mush size of the netting. It 

 is today the ri.ost Important gear in the shrimp i'ishary. (i^oe figur-o 



II - 19) 



The shrimp trawl consists of a cone-shapod bag in which tiio 

 catch is gathered in the tail or cod end, a wing on either side of 

 the bag for "herding" the shrimp into it, a trawl door or otter board 

 at the extreme end of each wing for holding the wings apart and holding 



81 



