The sun., 1895-05-27
DROWNED, NIGHT FISHING.
LOUIS sPECHT DISAPPEARED IN
THE HUDSON At 3 O'CLOCK A. NJ.

Ire Was Ono OF Many Fisher. for the rot
Who Populate tho Uptown Piers of
Nights-Tomcod ana Eeis Are What
They Catch While the Riuo Perch Sleep.
Louis Specht Of 100 Suffolk street and q
neighbor named Louis Jacoby wont fishing at
the foot Of West 1921 street on Saturday night.
AT 2 O'Clock yesterday morning II began to rain,
and they decided to return home. Jacoby
started up tho hill, expecting Specht to follow.
Hearing splash in the water. he turned. and,
seeing nothing OF Specht. he ran down the hill,
and, looking out across the water. caught sight
OF his comrades hat. drifting down with the
tide.
when there was no longer any chance that
Spccht would reappcar at tho surface Jacoby
went to the Washington Heights police station
and reported the drowning. lie could not tell
whether Specht had fallen or jumped over
board. Specht 2o years old and clerk
His body was not recovered.
To the uninitiatcd 1t may seem singular that
the young men chose to fish at nieht rather than
by daylight, but there are two good reasons that
populate the uptown piers with amateur fish
ermcn nightly. One is that eels and tomcods
take the hook more readily ut night than in tho
glaro Of the sunshine. The other is that the
rivers on either side of Manhattan Island
are densely populated with small fish
than a pin hook, and are next to worthless
The most active Of these fish is the bergall. or
blue perch. In the waters about New York
they rarely grow to be moro than five inches
long, and are mass Of bone, sharp spines, and
pure cussedness, according to tho fisherman'S
standard. Their jaws are armed with minute
but keen teeth. and they will strip hook of
bait with vicious tug which leads the amateur
to relate when he gets home that he just missed
catching the largest fish in the vicinity. Where
bergalls abound the fisherman can feed them
his best bait rapidly that better fish gets no
chance to take tho bait II he wants to.
The scales on a bergall are anchored with rare
1rmness. Keen spines ornament each I'm. and
are erected and stand straight out to pierce tho
hand OF the fisherman who attempts to take the
fish Off the hook. Small as they are. they fight
gamely when hooked. II one takes the trouble
to prepare and cook them, they will be found to
scale. and bony enough to be dif fic1lt to eat. =,
Their one redeeming feature is they rarely II
IS a.
large mouth and u determined disposition to
take good food on sig sight TN make him an easy fish
BY dav. and is such favorite food fish that hun
dreds OF amateur fishermen lose hours Of sleep
The fish are most plentiful in cool. frosty
weather, but the exceptionally cool spring has
kept them in New York waters longer than
Very many of the night fishermen choose the
darkness because they prefer cells to other fish,
and these slippery deniZens OF rivers and bays
take the bait most readily at night Bobbing
for eels is comparatively an unknown sport In
ally with the successful use of a bob 1t Is
practised on the mud flats In the Harlem River,
but even there the more skilful fisher
Of the mud with an .eight-tined eel spear.
Eels take the hook readily but quietly. SO that
the biggest of them are often hooked without
making sign until tho fisherman moves his
line: Then they often make a viEorous but
fishermen who frequent the Harlem piers and
waters are moro pot hunters than sportsmen.
The desire for big catch rather than the sport
OF entrapping and killing game fish leads them
to fish at night, when the smaller fish will not
interfere with the filling OF the basket.