A Perilous Catch

by Mike Smylie

  Mussels

  Prehistoric humans, along with their Roman successors, realised the benefits of gathering mussels – they are full of protein and easy to harvest. Coastal dwellers everywhere have followed this basic proviso that easily got, nutritious food is best reserved for the community.

  Conwy, in North Wales, had an estuary full of the seafood. However, although originally gathered for food, it seems that in the nineteenth century they were sought after more for their pearls than any nutritional benefit. Sacks and basketfuls were collected by hand, and placed in an iron pot in a sort of pit, and stamped upon like grapes at wine-making time. Once reduced to a pulp and with water added, the animal matter comes to the surface, which is then collected. This is duck food, while on the bottom of the pan lie the pearls, mixed in with all the sediment and sand. Washing with clean water soon exposed these pearls. Pearl fishing in this way was by no means confined to the River Conwy, as many of the main Welsh rivers were worked. Conwy simply produced more than anywhere else.

  J.O. Halliwell, travelling in North Wales before 1860, wrote:

  The mussels are found in considerable abundance at low water all along the shore at the entrance to the river, and are dredged by boatmen along the course of the river, as well as collected on the mussel banks. I tried my fortune with a dozen of them, a number which yielded nearly a dozen pearls, two of these the size of a pin’s head; the others were exceedingly minute.

  Up to 160 ounces were said to have been collected per week in the late nineteenth century and these fetched 2s 6d per ounce.12

  By the 1880s mussels were being collected for human consumption. Before the age of mechanism these had to be dredged by hand. Two methods were adopted – either using a hand rake from a small rowboat, or simply by harvesting them by hand. In the latter instance, the pickers, usually women in old times, made their way to their chosen stop by boat and gathered by hand, using a small knife called a twca to cut clumps of mussels away from the rocks. These were then bagged and put aboard the boat for carriage back to the quay. On the other hand, those dredging afloat used a rake with eight or so prongs – nominally not bigger than 3ft across the mouth – attached to a long pole up to 30ft in length. The mussels were forced into the prongs of the rake by pulling the rake along the seabed and, when the handle was vertical, the rake was flipped over so that the molluscs fall into the bag-net attached to its back. They were then hauled aboard and dumped into the boat. Once it was full, the fisherman returned to the quay. This method had the added benefit of preventing destruction to the mussel beds.

  Both catches were then sorted and washed before being purified by immersion in sterilised sea water containing chloride of lime to flush out their stomachs. Regulations stated that this process should take two days before they could be bagged, carried to the railway station by horse and cart and sent to markets in the Midlands. The first purification plant was opened in 1916 after national health scares.

  Each family in Conwy had their traditional point of embarkation and there were two fishermen in each boat. In 1929, the year of the earliest records, there were fifty-five mussel fishermen and by 1939 this had increased to seventy-five, including eight full-time women. During the war years when the men went to fight women ran the entire fishery.

  In the mussel purification plant at Conwy, alongside the now redundant fishing quay, fifty baskets of the shellfish are placed in each of four tanks, each tank holding three-quarters of a ton. These are left for forty-two hours, ultraviolet light being used to kill bacteria, before the baskets are removed, and the mussels fed into a conveyor system. They are then cleaned, riddled, scrubbed, brushed and finally bagged. Overall, three tons of mussels are processed every two days and fed into the British market.

  It’s important to clarify at this stage that Wales wasn’t the only home of the mussel fisheries. In the Wash, on the east coast, the small Lynn yolls sailed out to collect mussels from the extensive grounds. In Morecambe Bay, and around the River Lune, small specifically built flat-bottomed mussel boats collected from the banks. Further north, there were beds at Duddon at one time, where huge amounts of them were taken off by farmers for use as manure. As mussels were in extensive use by the long-line fishermen all around the coasts, especially so on the Scottish east coast, the fishermen even suggested that they should be banned from being eaten by humans to protect the beds. In reality it was probably the farmers that exhausted the supplies there, and, needless to say, human consumption was never forbidden, just rigorously controlled. Part of the legislation first issued in the beginning decades of the last century ensured proper purification at government-regulated plants, like the Conwy premises, and effective sealing of the bags of refined mussels to verify this at market.

  Mussels were often brought up in oyster dredges, but actual dredging for the bivalves never seems to have happened to any extent in Britain until the twentieth century. On the River Medway it is said that this was tested, but it obviously appeared ineffectual in comparison to hand-raking and picking. Whether the trawl was deemed inefficient, or purely a lack of sail power, is unclear, but it wasn’t until our modern age of mechanisation that dredging began in earnest.

  Today, however, the situation is very different. The largest supplier is in Bangor, North Wales, and the company dredges mussel spat and relays it upon the bed of the Menai Strait until it is ready for the market, at which time it is re-dredged and passed through the purification plant, then on to ready markets here and abroad.

  Oysters

  The Romans, it is said, had a special weakness for the oyster, collected around bays such as at Naples. The bloodthirsty Caligula was a fan, as was Horace, the leading Roman lyric poet, who once wrote:

  When I but see the oyster’s shell,

  I look and recognise the river, marsh, or mud

  Where it was raised.

  Britain, as for cockles and mussels, was once home to a thriving oyster cultivation business, although, it must be said, not on the same scale as that of the French, even then. In France, and especially Brittany, oysters are everywhere.

  Essex is purported to have produced the finest British oyster, although such areas as around Chichester might perhaps disagree. However, oysters from the latter area – Emsworth, in fact – were fed to those at two corporation banquets in Winchester in 1902, resulting in the death of, among several people, the Dean of Winchester. The sale of oysters from the area was instantly banned, but the event served to awaken the authorities to the problem of sewerage outfalls and pollution in other areas. Generally public confidence in oysters collapsed. The compulsory purification of oysters wasn’t enforced until the 1960s, and by then overall consumption was minute in comparison to what it had been. The price rose accordingly and it became known as the food of the rich!

  Much of the British oysters were dredged up from various parts of the inshore waters and set down on specific patches on the open shoreline. In parts, at some times of the year when the sea temperature was high enough, oysters would spawn and the spat could be dredged clinging to shells and stones on the seabed. This was altogether a haphazard and chancy business. Spat, however, did have one natural ground to emerge in Britain, and that was in Loch Ryan on Scotland’s west coast where the benefits from the Gulf Stream created conditions, especially in sea temperature, suited to spawning.

  Wales had a flourishing oyster trade that was centred on the small seaside village of Mumbles, to the west of industrial Swansea. Its other name of Oystermouth reflects the importance it once attached to the shellfish. Although seriously affected by the oyster’s decline at the beginning of the twentieth century, the fishery in Mumbles had been in existence for several centuries, and was indeed in full flow in the seventeenth century, when it was said to be the best in Britain.13 Here open boats were used to collect the undeveloped oysters which were then laid on beds on the beach in front of the village. These were split into perches so that each man or fishery had his own demarcated patch upon which his oysters were
laid. These open boats became decked about the middle of the nineteenth century, at which time they were equipped with masts. A dipping lugsail was carried to begin with, but it seems that many adopted a two-masted shallop rig, as did the pilot boats from nearby Swansea. This type of boat remained in service until the greedy east-coasters arrived in the late 1800s with their big smacks to denude these oyster grounds, taking thousands of the prized spat off to their home grounds. This overfishing most certainly contributed to the decline in Mumbles fortunes around the beginning of the twentieth century. However, prior to that, realising that to compete they had to sail further afield, the South Wales men had already adopted the east-coaster’s boat, bringing a whole host of these smacks in from outside. Most, it seems, were built in Devon and Cornwall, although the first to appear came from the River Colne in Essex. Their earlier craft consequently fell into disrepair.

  The village of Port Eynon lies just around the coast on the south coast of the Gower peninsular. Here, too, was a thriving oyster trade much the same as at Mumbles. Small skiffs sailed out and collected oysters to be laid on their beach to grow to maturity. Like their Mumbles counterparts, they too changed over to the smack, abandoning their early open boats. Some have suggested the salt house on the beach at Port Eynon, still clearly visible after recent works, was built to supply the local fisheries with salt. Whether this was for the oyster trade, or a possible herring fishery, seems unclear. Oysters, it is clear, have no demand for huge amounts of salt.

  To the west of Carmarthen Bay, oyster beds also lay to the north of Caldey Island and off Stackpole Head. These were dredged by small local Tenby luggers, solidly built craft that were used for all manner of fishing including drifting for herring, line fishing and oyster dredging.

  The east coast boats sailed as far north as the Isle of Whithorn. In the other direction the big first-class smacks fished off the Dutch coast. They supplied London with a seemingly never-ending catch of fresh oysters to satisfy the demanding people of the city. However, it must be said, that some writers seem to over-dramatise these Essex smacksmen by describing them as the hardest working of all fishermen. They certainly appear to have been an egotistical and avid lot in the nineteenth century and before, almost circumnavigating Britain in their plundering of other’s oyster beds, although they did receive some physical opposition in Scotland. Most fishermen have always managed to respect other’s fishing grounds and it is generally thought that this lot did not.

  Any mention of oysters must surely include the oyster fishermen of Falmouth. The fishermen here remain the only commercial boat people in Britain who still work under sail. On average there are some twelve Falmouth working boats that work the fishery, and under a local by-law, they must all dredge under sail. They might motor from port to fishing ground and home, but once the dredges are lowered, they must have their sails set. Two dredges are used, each being hauled by hand and the oysters hand-picked. Undersized oysters must be returned to the seabed if they cannot sit on a brass ring that is 67mm in diameter. They make a fine sight, these folk sailing back and forth around the bay, knowing that they, perhaps unwittingly, are keeping alive old traditions which, in turn, help to regulate the fishery.

  The fishing process appears simple to the untrained eye but this is not the case. I know this from the experience of one trip out. The boat, sails set to produce the tiniest of forward movement, has the dredges set so that the boat drifts with the current, almost beam on if the wind is in the favourable direction. The dredges, which are simple steel affairs with net-bags, are light enough to be handled over the side, and are hauled alternately, remaining down for ten minutes or so, which is the time it takes to haul in the other, empty the dredge, shoot it again and sort through the catch. Fishing is restricted to the months of October to March and daily from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m., except Saturday which is 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. and no fishing on Sunday. The timings are strict and all trawls should be up out of these hours. A bailiff is employed to check, as he does, and also that no undersized oysters are landed. The fishery, as well as that for the mussels, is regulated by Carrick District Council under the Port of Truro (Variation) Order 1975, although this is set to change in 2015 when regulatory control passes to DEFRA and its agents. Some say this will harm the fishery as faceless bureaucrats take control over those that know it well. Others say the fishermen are going to be more involved in the running and that overall, the change will have no adverse effect on the fishery. They say the fishery regulates itself by only allowing dredging under sail which itself is governed by the weather in general and the wind direction. It is labour intensive and has been estimated to produce some 50 tons of oysters a year. Currently the price is around £3 a kilo so it is worth £150,000 jointly to all the fishermen. Licences cost £165 annually per dredge.

  There are at least twelve who work under sail and about another ten who work from the so-called ‘haul-tow’ punts. These small punts anchor over the beds in shallow water and drift back with the tide. They then shoot their single dredge and, using a specially designed hand-powered double capstan, winch the boat back towards their anchor on one drum while the other drum winches the dredge. Once back to the anchor, the dredge is hauled in and emptied. Again each dredge costs the owner £165 in licence fees but they only have the one so this keeps the overheads down. Doing the mathematics, it is easy to see how, over seven months, the income isn’t outstanding. Each dredge, on average, nets one and a half tons, worth £4,500, and that’s in a good year. We were out for six hours and landed 18kg, perhaps worth a little over £50. Happily mooring fees at Mylor are free but over the winter it can be very cold out there, and lifting the dredges over the side hard work. And it’s hard on the back, even in ideal conditions. When the dredges are full, mostly of anything but oysters, they are really heavy and the difficult moment is when the framework is almost aboard but the bag itself still hangs overboard. There is a pivot point but it’s the last few inches I found most awkward. But persevere they do although most of the fishermen do have another job of out necessity and often carry on simply to continue traditions. You’d never make a proper living out of solely dredging under sail. Nevertheless, young blood is welcomed and, after a year’s fishing, the old-timers might just nod at the new boy.

  Richard Clapham hauling in a dredge aboard the Falmouth oyster dredger Holly Ann in 2014. This fishery is operated entirely under sail.

  Scallops

  In 2010, the UK fleet landed 43,000 tonnes of scallops (family Pectinidae), worth an estimated £54 million into UK ports, and scallops are now the third most valuable part of the UK fleet catch. Approximately 60 per cent of these scallops were exported to European countries, France in particular.

  The standard scallop dredge is effectively a large rake consisting of a 2.5ft wide metal frame fitted with a row of spaced teeth on the leading edge, which are fitted to a spring mounted bar. The spring means that if the dredge encounters any hard objects or obstructions on the seabed it allows the teeth to hinge backwards preventing the dredge from becoming stuck and preventing damage to gear and seabed. A number of dredges are attached to two poles which are towed behind the vessel. The number of dredges towed is, as is the physical dimensions of the dredge, strictly regulated and can vary from area to area depending on local by-laws.

  Scallop dredges hanging over the side of the scalloper Coral Strand II, CN267, entering the Crinan Canal in about 1996. Built for trawling in 1969, the boat was later re-rigged for dredging.

  The dredge is typically used on soft sand or shingle sediments and rakes scallops off the seabed or just below the surface which are then gathered by a collecting bag made of chain mail or netting. The fishing areas where scallop dredges can be used are strictly controlled with fragile seabed species and habitats being protected by Special Areas of Conservation (SAC) under the European Natura 2000 and proposed Marine Conservation Zones (MCZ) under the UK Marine Act. The majority of scallops are fished within the English Channel and the Irish Sea.

  Al
though scallops had been fished by a few boats since the beginning of the twentieth century, most of the catch was being used as bait. Most of what was fished came from the English Channel and parts of the coast off eastern England. It wasn’t until the 1950s that a substantial fishery developed, especially in the waters of the southwest, with boats working from Brixham. After 1975 this became a major fishery as the value of the scallop increased. Two specific grounds existed in the Channel: that between the Lizard and Portland Bill and the other between Selsey and Rye.14 Smaller areas were discovered in Cardigan Bay and off Wolf Rock.

  The Isle of Man is famous for the queen scallop (Aequipecten opercularis), a smaller scallop, generally known locally as the Manx Queenie. Whereas the scallop is found to the west, south and east of the island and to the south of the Chicken Rock, the queenies lie in a huge area lying to the east of the island and stretching from Burrow Head to almost Anglesey.