Upside-Down Fishing 



by T. D. Allen . . . painting by Sam B. Colburn 



T-IROM their breast-of-pampered-turkey flavor and their calla 

 JL lily texture you might expect them to be as difficult to obtain 

 as edelweiss and as scarce as dinosaur cutlets. Actually, they are 

 so plentiful that the season is open ten months out of twelve, and 

 more than a thousand miles of California coast line are open to 

 fishing for abalone. 



Furthermore, you don't have to dive or hire a boat or even get 

 your feet wet to fish. You don't need bait. And the best place to 

 get your tackle is in a junk yard. 



Abalone fishing, done by this dry-land, upside-down method, 

 is no sport for spectators. It is so strictly amateur and so alluring 

 that no spectator is ever able to remain neutrally upright for 

 long. And you need only one fishing license and one meager set 

 of junk-yard tackle for a large party of stalkers. Everybody who 

 can bend himself into a pretzel without getting dizzy can spot 

 abalone. The one with the license should also have muscles. He 

 pries the game off the rocks and carries the catch. A day's bag on 

 one license is five. If you take big ones only, five abalone will pro- 

 vide a belt-loosening feast for six or eight people at least five 

 dollars' worth of prepared succulence at the market. 



Want to go? Here's how. 



Search a junk yard for a good heavy leaf spring from an old 

 car, and file to an edge on one end only. This is your fishing 

 tackle. Your creel is a gunny sack. Heavy slacks and heavy gloves 



116 



