THE MACKEREL GILL-NET FISHERY. 297 
mentioned.* At first small open boats were used, such as the one described and figured in the 
another part of this report under the name of “Provincetown drag-boat.” About 1845, Province- 
town fishermen with their boats and nets essayed dragging for mackerel in the vicinity of Mon- 
hegan, Me., and by their example this practice was introduced into Maine, and since that time it 
has been carried on at various points on the coast. In 1873 twelve or fifteen vessels from 15 to 25 
tons each were employed at Portland; at present the number at this port is eighteen, and quite a 
fleet of the mackerel-draggers also belongs to the vicinity of Friendship, Me.t 
Along the southern coast of Nova Scotia, and about the vicinity of the Straits of Canso, there 
is an extensive gill-net fishery for mackerel carried on with stationary nets, and, in a smaller 
degree, a similar fishery is prosecuted in some parts of the Gulf of Saint Lawrence.{ This fishery, 
on the Nova Scotia coast is prosecuted when the mackerel are traversing the coast line in the 
spring and fall. 
“During the mackerel fishing season,” remarks Mr. J. Matthew i ones, “‘ the people along shore 
appear to live in a state of much excitement, expecting every hour the ‘runs’ to come into their 
bays. The traveler who may desire a horse and wagon to get on from place to place will find hard 
work to prevail upon the people to hire one out to him with a driver. Lookouts are kept on some 
elevated spot so that the schools may be seen some distance off, in order to give time for the fish- 
ermen to get off in their boats with the net.” As at Provincetown, these nets are anchored only 
at one end, the other end being left free to swing with the current. They are sometimes set as far 
as 10 or 12 miles from the shore, in water 20 to 50 fathoms in depth, care being taken to put them 
as nearly as possible in those localities which are known to lie in the “track” of the mackerel. 
The mackerel gill-nets are usually set with their upper lines close to the surface; sometimes, 
however, as much as 2 or 3 fathoms below. The position of the net in the water is regulated by 
the length of the buoy-ropes and the weight of the sinkers. As a rule, especially on the coast of 
Nova Scotia, they are, however, set close to the surface. 
In this region, also, there has been for many years an extensive seine fishery for mackerel, 
corresponding to that which is elsewhere referred to as having been formerly carried on, two hun- 
dred and fifty years ago, on the shores of Cape Cod Bay. The principal points for the seine fishery 
are at Margaret/s Bay, west of Halifax, and at Chedabucto Bay, at the eastern part of Nova Scotia. 
“Capt. N. E. Atwood, at Provincetown, writes as follows in regard to the introduction of the method of dragging 
for mackerel at Cape Cod: ‘‘As early as I can recollect most of the mackerel taken along our coast were caught with 
hook and line. A few gill-nets were set at moorings in our harbor and along the Truro shore during the first part of 
the mackerel] season, or as soon as the fish came in. The mackerel which were then taken in nets were sent to Boston 
market and sold fresh, sometimes bringing good prices. As the mackerel would not bite at the hook when they first 
struck in, we would often get two weeks’ fishing before a sufficient quantity of mackerel were caught on the hook to 
glut the market. Boston market being at that time small and no ice used in packing, only a few fresh fish could be 
sold there at any one time. 
“In 1841 I went to Monomoy Bay (Chatham) to fish for shad; we went out in the bay and put out our gill-nets 
and drifted with them all night if the weather would permit that mode of fishing, which we then and have always 
since called ‘dragging.’ On my return home to engage in the mackerel net fishery, very few had been caught in nets 
in our harbor, but large schools of mackerel had been passing in by Race Point and Wood End, and were going up 
the bay. I took ny mackerel nets in the boat and went out in the bay toward Plymouth, some 2 or 3 miles, and put 
them out and drifted all night; next morning I found I had a good catch. This occurrence took place about the 15th 
of June, 1841. - 
“It did not take the other fishermen long to get into this new way of fishing, and since that time this method of 
drag-fishing has been adopted along the coast of Maine and elsewhere.” 
{Friendship has twelve vessels, Cushing five, Waldoboro’ two, and Booth Bay and Bremen one each; the total 
from Maine, including those from Portland, being thirty-nine; the tonnage is 559.47; number of men, one hundred 
and thirty-three. 
}Schooner Yankee Lass, of Boston, arrived home last week from a season’s mackereling trip around the Seven 
Islands of Saint Lawrence River, with 300 barrels, all large No. 1 mackerel, taken in [gill] nets. (Cape Ann Adver- 
tiser, September 30, 1881.) 
