346 
BULLETIN OF THE UNITED STATES FISH COMMISSION. 
feet. The second funnel has an aperture of 3 feet at one end, and is closed at the other. Some of the 
fykes have wings 12 feet long on each side of the mouth, extending at an angle of 45 degrees. The 
size of mesh in the funnels is 14 inches, and in the leader and wings 3 inches. The fish are 
removed by lifting the small end of the second funnel, which is closed with a puckering string, and 
taking them out with a dip net. In the winter the nets are set at some distance below the surface, 
in order that they may not.be frozen in. 
There are 7 fyke-net fishermen, whose 5 boats are worth $50, their 43 fykes $382, and their minor 
apparatus and accessories $30. The products amounted to about 85,000 pounds, worth $2,400. 
The fishery in Maumee Bay was referred to as follows : 
The fyke nets of Maumee Bay are much larger and better than those about Monroe. They are 
somewhat similar to the small pound nets and are quite as effective. Instead of wings they have a 
a leader and set of hearts. The leader is 30 to 70 fathoms long, the hearts 8 to 14 fathoms long, and 
the bowl or pocket 12 to 14 feet long. The mesh is 4 to 5 inches in the leader, 3 inches in the hearts, 
and 2£ inches in the bowl. Their value ranges from $25 to $50 each. The total number in Maumee 
Bay was 39, worth $1,710. There is none in the river or along this part of the coast. They are fished 
in the spring and fall, and occasionally in winter. 
It was recorded of the fyke-net fishery of Ottawa County, Ohio, that — 
Three dozen fyke nets are fished in the mouth of Toussaint Creek in winter by the fishermen of 
that vicinity. The fykes proper are 14 feet long, the hearts 27 feet, and the leaders 165 feet. The 
size of mesh is 3 inches in the leader and hearts, and 2 inches in the fyke or bowl. In Portage River 
40 fyke nets are used near the seining beaches, sometimes in winter but usually during the spring 
and fall, by men who give most of their time to other fisheries. 
The following reference was made to the important fishing region embracing 
Sandusky Bay, the peninsula, and the Bass and other islands: 
On the outer shores of the peninsula and of Cedar Point and about the islands the most abundant 
species are whitefish and herring, but in the bay these do not occur, and the objects of pursuit are 
principally perch, saugers, bass, bullheads, and other species characteristic of the bays and river 
mouths. Pound' nets are the most popular form of apparatus in the .former section, where their 
number exceeds 300, though thousands of gill nets are fishing in the vicinity of the islands, and eight 
steam tugs and a large number of sailboats are devoted to this branch of the industry. 
All the fishing of the bay, with the exception of a little seining at the western end, is by means 
of fykes and small pound nets, which dot its shallow waters to the number of nine or ten hundred. 
Several seines are fished from the peninsula, both on the lake and the bay sides, and the fyke nets so 
numerous in the bay are also found in considerable numbers on the lake shore, though not used to any 
extent upon the islands. On the northern part of the peninsula, in the crotch between its two arms, 
are three marshy inlets with a total area of several thousand acres, which for about fifteen years have 
supported fyke-net fisheries of some importance. At present 107 nets are fished here by eight 
fishermen from the beginning of September to the 1st of May. The catch consists principally of 
bullheads and sunfish in fall, of bass in winter, and of grass pike in spring, with a large mixture of 
perch at all seasons. The fyke nets of the island region are mostly made of second-hand twine. The 
fyke proper, or pot, is 20 feet long, the hearts are 48 feet long, and the leaders, from 150 to 300 feet 
long. The size of the mesh is 4-J inches in the leader, 4 inches in the hearts, and 24 inches in the’pot. 
LAKE ONTARIO. 
In proportion to the extent of its general fisheries, there is no lake in which the 
fyke net is of greater importance than in Lake Ontario. An investigation* of the 
fisheries of this lake, conducted by the writer in 1891, disclosed the fact that the 
products of the entire industry in 1890 amounted to 3,446,448 pounds, valued at 
$124,786, while, as has been stated, the fyke-net catch alone was 899,527 pounds, 
having a value of $22,561; more than a-fourth of the quantity and nearly a fifth of the 
value of the catch thus represented the output of the fykes. 
* Report on an Investigation of the Fisheries of Lake Ontario. Bull. U. S. Fish Commission, 1890. 
