Waterbury evening Democrat., 1894-09-05
CATCHING JEWFISH.
ANGLING FOR MARINE MONSTERS IN
 SAN DIEGO BAY.
The Process Is of the Progressive Kind. The Part Toothpieks Piay-The Run With aKer-Members of the Bass Family That Weigh Hundreds of Pounds

The Process Is of the Progressive Kind.
 The Part Toothpicks Piay-The Run With
 aKeg-Members of the Bass Family That
 Weigh Hundreds of Pounds
 Don't talk to a man from southern California about black bass fishing, or he will make your best bass story fee ble. pitiful thing. He will tell you of black bass that could swallow the big gest days catch you ever made and take in your creel for dessert without as much as gulping. Voice a doubt, and the man from San Diego will pull from his fishing traps something that looks like one fiuked ships anchor. That is what he fishes with for the strange, monstruus black bass in the hays and about the islands uf the southern Cali fornia coast. They don't call them black bass down there. though the fish com missioners say they are, and the natu- ralists have identified them by fins and bones and form with the gamy two and three pounders that make men ficklc even to trout.
 The men who catch these fish that sometimes weigh l. GOO pounds call them iewfish-a corruption of junefish. The last is a translation uf one of their Mex ican names Probably they were called junefish from the fart that they arc plentiful along the shores in the late spring and carly summer. No matter how he got his name. the jewish is a wonder. He looks like n bass fiShsrman's nightmare when they rCt him out of the water. Every fin and mark is there, magnified out of all proportion. His scales are as big us half dollars. his mouth is gaping chasn. and the spikes of his dorsal fin arc bigger than tenpen- ny nails.
 The process of catching q jewish is q progressive and interesting one The fishers begin at the beginning. With bent pins or dip nets they look for min nows or sarIlellesI The quarry secured. it promptly becomes bait. and the cun- course is treated t0 smelt fishing. Then comes the smelt's turn in the succes- sion- He is impaled, and the fisherman, with heavier rod and larger hook, goes to the other side of the wharf for Q halibut or q sea bass
 When the bait, dead or alive, is ready, the stoutest armed man on the wharf picks up the line. He swings the two or three pounds of bait around his head like an Indian does the bOlaS and hurls it scaward. The great line. as thick as lead pencil, coils out after the hook, and that is nearly all until the fish comes along.
 Incidentally tOothpicks play quite a part in the fishing. Each fisherman takes handful with him when he leaves the breakfast table. They stick one in Q crack at the top of pile and loosely loop the line around it. The shore part of the line is cOiled on the wharf. and the end is fast tc an empty powder keg or some such thing that will float we'll On the toothpick is stuck q bit of white rag, and as half dozen or n dozen lines are used at once there is a string of these little signal flags all along the | dock The fisherman has nothing more to do for awhile than to watch the flags When one goes down, it means that something has taken the bait After gathering in tho barrlcouda heads or ! the impaled halibut the jewish starts away like the locomotive on a fast Cx- press. Down goes the signal flag Everybody around runs for tho line They know they can't hold the fish. but the resistance makes it harder for him and helps them to tire him Out-the ul- timate object. Tine great fish does not struggle at first. but moves steadily sea ward, pulling the line through the | mems hands Occasionally. when the fish weighs less than 200 pounds, they can tire him out without paving out all of the line, hut usually it all GoCs. and presently the struggle is transferred tO the water. The empty powder kcE bounces over the water most crratical- | ly, the men chase it in n boat, and when they catch it hold on. Then the real fun of jewfishing begins IL is just sport for n fish of any size to tow a whitehall around the bay, and iti pret- " rough sailing in his wake As soon as he realizes that there is fight un the | jewish seems to forget that he is a staid bottom fish All the steam of his black bass ancestors gets riley, and he plunges and turns, twists and strikes SuIne- wherc down in the cavern of his gullci he has an arrangement of bone like q couple uf millstoncS. and when Inc dis covers he cannot spit out the hook Inc tries to swallow it and grind the line apart, so tho slack has tn be carefully attended tNA nSEN AIt riiltt NEtiaAtAlasNN- fish in San Diego bay. and though th5 hooks arc made of hand forged tool stcrl they have snapped many of them
 If everything cuss well. if tho hUOk holds and the fish does not grind th, line. if he steers away from submerged buoy chains and dNcks. the fight must end in the death of the fish SUmctimcs he tnws the l,uat for thrCc hours bCturc his strength i< gone and hH is hauled to the su-faCe- The death struggle is worst of all The fish is dragged tO tho top and lies thCrc, apparently all but dead Then they drive harpoOn into him, and the sting Of the steel starts all his life again The harpOOn line hold: him near the surface, and he makes ] great race for a little while. but, d course, it cannot last. At the end tn, fish Is tOwed back 10 the dock. and ther' the floating population of San Diego i' assembled Everybody gets hold of | rope and hoists the giant fish upon th' dock, and there the tired monster fiuun ders, its mouth gaping like n tunnc and its eyes. big as baseballs. starting
 from their socketS-San Francisco Ex
 aminer.
 Two Points o< View
 wife-HOw people gaze at my new
 dressl I presume they wonder if l'v'