The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1894-08-05
FISHING WITH A LONG LINE.
One of It's Largest Catches Was Ton
or More Of Jewish.
From the San Francisco Chronicle.

The beach at Laguna is a fine one for
walking and bathing. The rocks are cut
and worn into arches, caves and huge
platforms, with great spout holes, into
which the water pours, bursting upward
into natural fountains, making the ada
cent rocks culver and shake.
Crawling over rocks that hid countless
anemones under richly colored seaweeds,
came TO little cave where the fisher
men make their headquarters. A great
bluff formed the shelter, and as deep
water came inshore, a harbor was made
for landing the dories. A little shauty on
the high sand, dozen boats. a pile of
crawfish straps, the tails of several
sharks told the story, and as a center
piece grizzly old fellow, the generals
simo. He was waiting for the baiters,
for the line he used needed not one man,
but dozen or more, to bait it, AS we
stood there they began to come in from
the hills and over the beach from out of
the hooks and corners. The tackle used
was fish line mile in length. On each
end was an anchor and a buoy in the
shape of a soldered-up oil can, and at
every three feet or so of this line was a
hook, 900 or more being needed for a
single line. The line was laid out in
coils, and the men, sitting around, baited
the hooks, replaced them when neces-
sary, and coiled the line as they baited
Yes, said the sociable old fisherman,
this is pretty sure way of fishing You
see, we cover a mile of ground at a time,
and every fish that's swimming down
that territory is pretty sure to strike one
of the 800 hooks. They hook themselves,
you see: they swallow the bait, then run
OFF with 1t, or try to, and the weight of
the line brings them up with round turn
Now we mostly take rock cod, but fish
change as the season does. We set the
trawl at 3 O'Clock in the morning The
line is coiled in the stern of the boat, and
when we get in the right spot, clear of
the kelp, the anchor is lowered, taking
the end of the line down with it, When
we strike bottom we toss over the buoy
and row away, paying out slowly till the
end comes, when the other anchor is
tossed over and buoy; then we have the
line stretched over a mile of bottom with
bait every two or three feet Mighty
few fish pass it. This we let stay several
hours and then we haul in, from both
ends. Luck varies; I've taken in that
line when we almost filed the boat
every hook would have something. Then
again, luck changes.
"One day we pulled out to the line, but
not can was in sight. There wasn't
any mistake, as we had our bearings
exact, so the only thing to do was to con
clude That something had happened We
pulled up and down the coast, then out to
sea, and just as we were about giving it
up we saw one of the cans bob Ip and
then disappear. We managed to hook il
up, and when we began to take in
thought we had hooked a whale; but the
first fish that hove in sight was a shark
about six feet long; then came a stretch
of twenty hooks gone, then a shark. then
sharks by the dozen in fact, there must
have been twenty or thirty sharks on the
line, not to speak of those that had been
on. We cut them loose the best we could,
and figured up our losses in fish
hooks, line, and bait at about $50. You
see, school of half starved shovel-nosed
sharks mad dropped in just in time and
had taken the fish that had been hooked
and so got hooked in turn. Another time
we lost the line for a day. and finally
found it foul of kelp bed and when we
got 1t up 1t was next TO impossible to take
1t in. thought we had a whale that
time, but IT was jewish; there were
seven or eight hooked, and their com
bined weight wasn't less than ton. Some
we took, and the rest we cut loose. There
isn't much call for homeless cod lust
now, said the old man with a wink.
"Once or twice, - he continued, IL have
lost the whole outfit. Once a big basking
shark wound it up so that we never could
clear lts ana anOJner time a whale walked
of with the whole thing. Sharks are the
worst; when fish gets hooked they come
along ana bite it of, leaving the head
then another shark comes along and takes
the head aud the hook. We get curious
things. Sometimes cells get hooked. then
sting rays, Once a big octopus got on
ana when il climbed into the boat we rot
ready to go overheard, but a knock on Jhe
head settled him"
Conan Doyle, the popular novelist. is said