I went out gillnet fishing on a 1951 Columbia gillnet boat, bowpicker type. It is the last of its kind still fishing. I sought out the experience because I am currently documenting boats of this type for CRMM. These boats put out long nets into which fish swim and become trapped, the net snaring them behind the gills. It is done at night, when the fish cannot see. My camera was in the shop at the time, so you will have to be content with my notes. It was dark, anyway.
3 pm- Tom and I meet at the west mooring basin in Astoria, OR so that I can be introduced to the boat and captain. The boat is much of the type of those that I am working on, to my delight. Tom has fished in this boat since the 1960s, and does it more or less for the poetry of it now, he being a successful lawyer in Portland. He refers to the boat as a “family relic.” I understand perfectly.
7 pm- First drift. The season lasts from 7pm to 7 am, though it is not expected that anything will be caught until dark, some two hours off. We are at the top of the flood now, however, and we only have a few hours before the ebb starts moving in earnest and fishing becomes impossible. Tom is happy, engaged, expectant, but realistic about our take. He looks for ten fish tonight, 200lbs of chinook salmon. We look for a spot to lay out, find one, but are eased out by neighbor. Positioning is everything when each boat lays out 250 fathoms (1500 feet) of net. We find a spot and lay out, Tom guiding the net over the transom in a long stream while I keep the boat on a heading. When it comes to pull the net in, I am at the wheel while Tom pulls in the net, hand over hand, 1500 feet long and 36 feet deep. The 2-foot wide hydraulic drum squeals impotently, reminds me of a coffee grinder. I offer to take a shift pulling in the net, but he declines. Our catch is several jellyfish and a big stick.
9 pm- Second drift. We have more luck this time, it being “fish dark” and we leaving the net in longer, having more space. We catch a salmon in the first 40 feet, Tom saying “This is what I’ve been looking for!” as the silvery brown mass nears the surface. One more salmon, then an oversize sturgeon, probably 6 feet long, Tom can tell he’s too big by the size of his head, and as he rages to the surface he seems about 8 feet. The awkward, improbable animal is a source of consternation for Tom and fascination for myself. With a bit of cursing and encouragement Tom frees the powerful fish from the net without bringing him inboard, much to my disappointment. Two more fish. The fifth salmon might be a “tooley,” a less-desirable sub-species with colorless flesh. Tom gaffs him expertly across the bridge of the nose and brings him in. At the end of the net is another sturgeon, a bit smaller, which Tom brings aboard and expertly jerks from the net. He pitches it backwards off the starboard bow, one handed, without a second glance.
It becomes clear to me over the course of this drift that the net is a complex instrument, which needs expert handling. It is 1500 feet long and 36 feet wide, with holes 8 inches wide. It has floats at the top and a weighted snake at the bottom. Laying it out, taking it up, getting fish out of it, and stowing it, without tangling or tearing it is a very tricky operation. Tom hold the floats in his right hand as he pulls it aboard, gathering the rest in his left hand, hooping it into 6 foot folds and piling the flakes athwartships.
11 pm- Flood. The tide is moving to fast to fish now, so we anchor in Hungry Harbor (which, I am told, is just between Blind Bay and the Dismal Niche, inside Cape Dissapointment) We eat turkey sandwiches and granola bars, and marvel at the calm weather. It is quiet. Tom has been communicating all evening with other fisherman by cell phone. I ask and he confirms that the cell phone has largely replaced radios for this purpose. It seems not too many people will be “staying out for low water,” to fish from the bottom of the ebb until morning. We will, however, and lay down to sleep.
This boat has been repowered, the original Chysler Crown straight 6 having been replaced with a Crusader 305 V-8. The wider engine necessitated the removal of the bunks, which once lay for-an-aft on either side of the motor. No small sacrifice, I find. Sleep in the true sense is impossible, both of us trying to lay out in the 3-foot long aftercockpit with our legs through the engine room door. Nevertheless it is restful.
1:20 AM- my familiar alarm sounds and we rise, gratefully. We stow our bedding of lifejackets and pee over opposite sides. We bump gently against a neighbor, the odd currents of the ebb having brought us aboard of one-another. We drive over his anchor line to retrieve our own, proving the efficacy of the basket around the propeller of our boat. Drinking coffee we head back to the fishing grounds, already well-populated by other boats. I am at a loss as to how Tom can pick out a spot in this darkness, with each boat trailing 1500 feet of net, laid in all directions. How to connect the blinking lights at the end of the nets with the boats? To judge the tidal currents so that nets will not drift into each other?
3:30 AM- We have a “good show,” lots of space, for our drift now, a little downstream of the rest of the fleet. Tom is happy and philosophical, also apprehensive, generally at a high pitch. It is peculiarly straining to fish in this way, standing, waiting, with no idea what is happening in your net.
We bring in our net after an hour and twenty minutes, catching one sturgeon too small and another too big. This 7-foot fish is deep into the net, and must be brought aboard to be freed. I am asked forward to help heave him over the rail. The sides of the boat sloping inwards away from the rail make it hard to get a good purchase. In the water he is the expression of languid power, inboard he is lethargic. Tom works furiously and I try to keep up and follow his motions, as we find the fish in 36 feet of netting and try to extricate him. A few powerful shakes of his body are all the protest he gives. He is an odd but not an alien creature, old but neither wise nor froward. Of another time, and wanting to be left alone. His skin is very hard, even between the heavy plates along his back and on either side of his belly. He has no teeth, only a fleshy slot of a mouth, which is a great comfort. We get him out and heave him over the side, his body slipping over my thigh, the plates bruising my leg.
5:30 AM- We are heading for the bridge for our last couple drifts, a little lightness in the sky showing the hills on the Washington side an emerald green of great depth, with mist on their tops. We fish until the last moment, wrenching another sturgeon out of the net hurriedly at a quarter to seven. If we do not have the net inboard by 7 am, we risk a fine. We get it all inboard in time, and head for the dock. Eleven salmon: we have made our catch.
