90 AMRROSE — ON FISHES OF 8T' BIARGARET's BAY. 



Our shore-people have none of that squeamishness Avhich ex- 

 chides eels from the tables of our inland population. When 

 once the ice has become sutiicienliy strong to carry a man over 

 the eel-beds, not a fine day in winter passes without seeing a 

 party of eel-spearers at almost every muddy-bottomed cove 

 around the Bay. There, standing on two or three spruce boughs 

 to keep his feet off the ice, but often regardless of cold feet, 

 stands the patient and laborious fisherman, darting with both 

 hands his spear, by its long slender handle, into the mud below. 

 Ten or fifteen dozen eels in a day are considered good catch, 

 though if one does not happen to strike a good spot a man may 

 not catch more than two or three, as eels are gregarious, even 

 in their winter quarters. Many years ago eels v;ere much more 

 plentiful in the in-shore mud-banks than now% — for of late years 

 their haunts are so torn up by the spears, th;it the eel-grass is 

 not nearly so abundant as formerly. 



Eels are much more delicate in winter than in summer, w:hen 

 they live on garbage and become very fat. In the warm days 

 of July and August, they thoroughly enjoy themselves, basking 

 in the sun, as they lie on the bent tops of the floating eel-grass, 

 at half tide or low water. They also hang perpendicularly, 

 mostly with the tail, but occasionally with the head down- 

 wards. Then the keen-eyed fisherman, from his boat, 

 detects his prey, invisible to the uninitiated, and secures 

 the writhing victim between the tenacious jaws of his wooden 

 spear. A gi-eat many also arc caught in eel-pots of wicker- 

 work, into which they enter, like rats into the funnel of 

 a cage-trap, and — once in — cannot get out. These pots are 

 baited with squid, when they can be had — as this is the fiivourite 

 food of the eel, — but more frequently a crushed lobster is placed 

 within as the attrait. The pot is then sunk by attaching a rock 

 to it, and, after a reasonable time, is hauled up, often well-filled 

 with the squirming prey. 



Bobbing for eels is seldom practised here. One surnm^r's 

 afternoon, when a boy, I caught a large number of fine fat eels 

 in the flood tide of the coffee-coloured Shubenacadie, near Mait-. 

 land, by the very simple plan of wadiug into the river to my 

 knees, holding the bait on the muddy bottom with one hand. 



