34 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 



steamers proper, as distinguished from those collecting fish or " tend- 

 ing" pound-nets, are provided only with gill- nets. The larger steamers 

 carry an enormous outfit, some of those at Duluth having more than 

 20 miles of netting, about one-fourth of which is kept constantly in 

 the water. The mesh of the nets for whitefish and trout varies accord- 

 ing to locality. That for trout in the fall and that for whitefish in the 

 vicinity of Isle Royale is from 5J to 6 inches, which is about an inch 

 larger than the mesh employed for the capture of whitefish during the 

 spring and summer months. Gill-nets are the only kind of apparatus 

 suitable for use in the siscowet fishery, which is now extensively prose- 

 cuted in the deeper waters of the lake at a considerable distance from 

 shore. A few nets of small mesh are employed for the capture of her- 

 ring in the fall and early winter, both in open water and through the 

 ice. Whitefish are also taken in considerable quantities with larger 

 nets fished through the ice. 



Gill-nets are in very general use by the fishermen of Duluth, who set 

 them in various localities along the north shore and about Isle Royale. 

 They are less extensively used than formerly at Bayfield, as pound-nets 

 have come to be substituted to a large degree, though some of the 

 men still employ them exclusively, and a majority of the other fisher- 

 men, after removing their pound-nets in August, operate gill-nets 

 for the capture of trout and whitefish during the remainder of the 

 season. The fishermen residing on Keweenaw Peninsula catch a 

 majority of their fish with this form of apparatus, and at Marquette 

 the steamer and sail- boat fishermen use them extensively. At Grand 

 Marais they are the only nets employed, and at Whitefish Point large 

 quantities of fish are taken in them. 



Ice-fishing — Winter ice-fishing has never been extensively carried on 

 in the waters of Lake {Superior, though the Indians have for many years 

 used spears and decoys for catching fish when their supply of other food 

 has become exhausted. Recently a limited winter fishery has sprung 

 up at Duluth, and the fishermen of Bayfield are similarly engaged 

 about the Apostle Islands and in Chaquamegon Bay for a few weeks. 

 As already mentioned, gill-nets are occasionally fished through the' 

 ice for whitefish, but the principal methods of fishing at this season 

 are with set-hooks and with spears. The former are attached to bent 

 twigs, the free end having a line attached and bearing a flag, which 

 serves as a signal to indicate that a fish has been hooked. A hundred 

 or more of these are frequently set in a row through holes cut in the ice, 

 while the fishermen occupy themselves in keeping the holes clear from 

 ice and in removing the trout. The spears are used in connection with 

 fish -lures or decoys, which are suspended in the water and kept in 

 motion by means of a string, the fisherman standing just above the 

 hole in the ice and spearing any trout that are attracted by the decoy. 



Dip-net fishing. — Another form of fishing, one which is peculiar to 

 this lake, is the dip-net fishing by the Indians in the rapids at 



