AWARD OF THE FISHERY COMMISSION. 1449 



No. 313. 



I, CHARLES MCEACHAN, of Township Number Forty-six, North Side 

 justice of the peace, and manager of fishing stage, make oath and sav: 



1. That I have been engaged in boat fishing on the north side of thin 

 part of the island for the last twenty-four years, and am well acquainted 

 with the fishing on that side. 



2. That from the North Lake to Saint Margarets, on the same side, a 

 distance of fourteen miles, there are, this year, at leant sixty boau 

 engaged in fishing. The boats are increasing in number and improving. 

 The number of boats has trebled in the last three years. The reasons 

 that I would give are that there is now good encouragement given to men 

 to go in for fishing; the business pays now ; and many men who formerly 

 went to the States to fish on the American shores found they could not 

 do so well there and returned here, and many of them have taken to 

 boat-fishing. The fishing employs a great many people who could not 

 get employment, and could scarcely exist in any other way. The fish- 

 ery is a ready-money business, and puts a lot of cash in circulation. 

 The boat-fishing for the past two years, when the Americans were not 

 so numerous on the shore as they were before and as they were this year, 

 has been better than it was when they were around. 



3. That the boats, in the distance mentioned above, take from throe 

 to five hands each as crew ; they would average four. That does not 

 include the men who are employed on shore, who are a considerable 

 number. These boats get herring enough for mackerel bait and for 

 home use every year ; if attention were directed to that branch, there 

 could be as many herring taken as could be required. The average 

 catches of the boats are at least sixty quintals to the boat ; some boats 

 double that number and others do not get so many. A great many 

 more codfish might be taken, only the owners of a large number of the 

 boats are farmers as well as fishermen, and only fish when they have 

 time from their farming, and that lowers the average all round. The 

 boats also take at least thirty-five barrels of mackerel for the season, and 

 the average is greatly lessened by the same reason given for the codfish, 

 that the men farm as well as fish. 



' 4. That nearly all these fish are taken at from one to three miles of 

 the shore; along the shore is the best fishing ground. 



5. That there are nearly every season over five hundred sail of Amer- 

 ican fishing schooners fishing in the gulf. AVe can see them passing 

 along by where we are fishing. I have some days seen two hundred of 

 them passing by in a day. These vessels fish very much close in to the 

 shore. 



6. That the Americans do a lot of harm to our boat-fishing by coming 

 in shore and lee-bowing the boats, and taking the fish away Iroiu the 

 latter. They come in, throw bait near the shore, and drift off, drawing 

 the mackerel after them. "We always look upon the coming of the 

 Americans as the end of the good fishing. They clean large quantit 



of fish on the grounds and throw the offal overboard ; this glut* 

 poisons the fish so that they won't bite, and our boat-fishing is thereby 

 spoiled. 



7. The year the cutters were about they kept the American sch 

 off to a great extent, and we were very sorry when the cutters 

 taken away. f 



8. That the American seiners are coming round here this year : 

 them took a hundred barrels at one throw of the seine, ofl 

 shore the other day, and they kill more fish than they use 



