FISHERIES OF THE GREAT LAKES IN 1885. 255 



boats, G scows, and 70 small boats, or 100 in all, worth $7,065. The 

 apparatus used were 980 gill-nets, valued at $2,088 ; 73 pound-nets, 

 worth 22,475; 6 seines, worth $1,200; 76 fykes, valued at $966; 110 set- 

 lines, with 90,800 hooks, worth $1,850. Twenty-seven fish-cars, worth 

 $486, were used by the dealers. The value of other apparatus and acces- 

 sories was nearly $6,000, and that of the shore property was $38,795. 

 The dealers had a cash capital of $5,000. 



The products consisted of 160,000 pounds of wall-eyed pike, 49,000 

 pounds of bass, 146,500 pounds of whiteftsh, 995,000 pounds of herring, 

 577 pounds of bull-heads and catfish, 36,000 pounds of sturgeon, 1,012,000 

 pounds of saugers, 275,000 pounds of perch, sunfish, and suckers, and 

 58,500 pounds of miscellaneous fish, principally grass-pike. The total 

 quantity was thus over 3,300,000 pounds, having a value to the fishermen 

 of $52,500. 



Pound-net fishery. — Mr. Bell says that a pound-net which he helped 

 to fish 5 or 6 miles west of Port Clinton, in the fall of 1852, was the 

 first one set in Lake Erie outside .of Maumee and Sandusky Bays. 

 Pound-nets were used the same fall near Port Clinton and off Marble- 

 head with excellent success, and the number continually increased until 

 1885, when there were thirty-five just east of Locust Point and thirty- 

 eight near Port Clinton. 



The one first set was made by cutting up two seines, and differed in 

 some respects from those now in use. No funnel was used, and the 

 heart led directly into a large and awkward pot or " crib," circular in 

 form. The circumference of the crib was 198 feet, and the length of the 

 leader 825 feet. Most of the ponnd-nets now in use are fished both in 

 spring and fall, though there is an insignificant number which is set only 

 in the fall. On account of the exceptional shallowness of the western 

 end of the lake, and the levelness of the bottom, there is no natural 

 limit to the number of pound-nets which can be set in a single string, 

 aud they might with perfect facility be set one after another entirely 

 across the lake. The uets at Locust Point are set in four strings, two 

 of which, containing five and twelve or fifteen pounds, respectively, 

 start from points about 5 miles from land, the shortest running out to 

 Niagara Reef and the other beyond it. The catch in these nets is much 

 better than in the ones nearer shore. The depth of the pound-nets for 

 the whole region varies from 12 to 35 feet, averaging a little over 20 

 feet. The deepest net in the 10-mile string at Port Clinton is 30 feet, 

 and the shoal est is 16 feet. 



Gill-net fishery. — Gill-nets are fished in spring, principally for saugers, 

 near the shore and in the mouths of the rivers; aud in the fall, from 

 the latter part of October to the 1st of December, for white-fish on 

 Niagara Eeef. 



The sauger nets are 33 fathoms long and 5 feet deep, with a 2J-inch 

 mesh ; those for whitefish on the reef are the same in depth, but are 40 

 to 55 fathoms long and have a 5J-inch mesh. The gill-net crews fishing 



