FISHING VESSELS AND BOATS OF THE PACIFIC COAST. 
45 
28. Oyster scows . — In the oyster fisheries of San Francisco Bay flat-bottomed, 
square-ended scows of varying sizes are employed for tonging and for other purposes. 
These scows are unpainted, roughly built structures, being wide and shallow. Those 
used for tonging have a flush deck with a low railing. They are about 18 to 20 feet 
long and 7 or 8 feet wide. A large open scow, some 16 to 18 feet wide and about 35 
feet in length, is used for storage purposes, to receive material, boxes, and the oysters 
after they have been culled, etc. This is permanently moored near the station on the 
bay. Alongside of it is a square-ended float or scow upon which the oysters are culled 
when they are brought in by the fishermen. This has about the same dimensions as 
one of the tonging scows. 
VIII.— DORIES AND SHARPIES. 
29. General statement . — The fishermen who have been trained on the Atlantic; 
coast have naturally carried with them to the West a preference for certain types of 
fishing boats which long experience has shown to be specially well adapted to certain 
work. Thus the dory, which is so extensively employed in the deep-sea fishery of the 
Atlantic, has been introduced on the Pacific, and its use has increased continuously. 
In many cases dories built in the East have been brought across the Continent by 
rail, but generally it has been found most profitable to build them on the west coast. But 
while the building of dories might appear to be a simple matter, the attempt to imitate 
the Atlantic type has usually been a partial failure at the best. Though the west 
coast dory is generally copied after its Eastern prototype it usually lacks the grace and 
lightness of the latter, and often has special characteristics of its own. Some of the 
Fig. 4. Salmon Dory. 
so-called dories used in the salmon fishery of Alaska are hybrids — a type between the 
dory and the sharpy. They usually have the bow, sheer, and bottom of the typical 
dory, but differ in having a much wider stern, which, however, is narrower and much 
deeper than the stern of a sharpy. This modification is caused by the need for addi 
tional buoyancy at the stern, but the general form of the dory (which is so excellently 
adapted to use in rough water and to land upon a beach in a surf) is preserved. 
In Alaska, particularly at St. Paul, dories are built by the Indians and Creoles for 
general use about the harbor and islands. Spruce and cedar are used in their construc- 
tion. Alexander says they approximate to the shape and general appearance of the 
New England dory, but are not good copies. But, in view of the fact that white men 
