108 DUBLIN NATITEAX HISTORY SOCIETY. 



This arises from various causes, but none has, in my opinion, been so 

 active as too close fishing of the ground, and the consequent destruction 

 of the young, which, though unmarketable, are used as bait by the 

 fishermen, — in some cases foolishly, as for baiting the whelk pots. In 

 the summer hand-line fisheries hardly any other bait is used when crabs 

 are procurable ; and this might be avoided, for I have found the velvet 

 cleanser crab {Port, puher) equally efficacious as a substitute. The 

 grounds in which these animals are found are rocky, weedy bottoms, — 

 hence the fisheries are confined to a short distance of the shores. The 

 chief places about Dublin are Skerries, Howth, Kingstown, Dalkey, and 

 Bullock. The fisheries used to be carried on solely by wicker pots, 

 made on the principle of the common wire mouse-trap, but with the 

 opening at the top. Latterly, about Kingstown and Dalkey, the drum- 

 net has superseded the pot. It is made of net stretched in the form of 

 a drum, on hoops, with openings at opposite ends, one opening being at 

 the top, the other at the bottom. From the hoops the bait, consisting 

 of bits of fish, is suspended by means of withes, generally made of the 

 common briar. These are sunk, and left down a certain number of 

 hours, when they are taken up, the crabs, &c., removed, and the pots 

 or drums rebaited, and sunk again. On the west coast crabs, &c,, are 

 taken by a method I never saw used about Dublin, — an open hoop, 

 having two lines set crosswise on it, and below furnished with a bag- 

 net ; this is fastened to a strong line, of sufficient length, bait attached 

 to the cross lines, and the apparatus then lowered into the sea (this kind 

 of fishing being practised from high shores) ; after the lapse of ten or 

 fifteen minutes, it is drawn up, and the crabs, &c., found in the bag. 

 When pots, &c., are used, the fishing is most precarious ; the pots are 

 frequently lost through gales, or carrying away of the buoys by passing 

 vessels ; and as the baits require to be frequently renewed, it often hap- 

 pens, when the crabs are scarce, that the cost of the bait exceeds the 

 value of the capture. The crabs taken at Skerries are generally of large 

 size, but epicures prefer those captured about Bullock and Dalkey, which 

 are moderate sized, plump, and heavier in proportion, though, singularly 

 enough, those captured at the back of the east pier at Kingstown are 

 mostly inferior. I suppose the feeding grounds have something to say 

 to it, the Bullock grounds being free from the influence of the sewerage, 

 which seriously affects the Kingstown grounds. 



2. The lobster {Homarus vulgaris). The remarks made concerning 

 the modes of capture and feeding grounds of the common crab apply to 

 this species likewise, except that it prefers a stale bait. Heavy gales 

 affect the supply of the two species in a remarkable manner. This last 

 season, after the heavy gales of the 9th February, 1861, proved a very 

 bad one, probably the disturbance of the rocks near the shore had some- 

 thing to say to it, by causing the destruction of their feeding places. 

 They have much fallen off in numbers of late years. Eutty has a 

 curious statement about this species in his Natural History of Dublin, 

 vol. i., p. 371. He says : — " This is native and good at Howth and 

 Lambay ; but what they have good at Bullock they bring from Water- 



