Page:The Pacific Monthly volumes 1-3.djvu/92

 waters of the Rockies and the Cascades, and eager to ascend to the spawning grounds, from whence, it is claimed, they never return. And who can blame the fisherman, if he takes his life in his hand and sails out to meet his fate upon the bar? Once inside the wide mouth of the river the fish scatter, and are not so easily taken in large numbers.

Another lure to danger in this connection is the fact that salmon delight to sport in the breakers. It is positively known that, if it were possible for a 300-fathom net to fish on Peacock spit at certain times when the tide is full, a boatload of salmon could be caught as rapidly as the net could be hauled in. Men with more daring than discretion have made the attempt and lost their lives in consequence.

Gillnet fishing is carried on by night as well as by day, but usually, when night work is profitable, it is not practicable to fish on the day tides. Generally speaking, the heaviest catches are made between sunrise and sunset from the opening of the season up to June or July; the remaining months the opposite is the case. The reason for this lies in the fact that salmon can only be caught in the meshes of a gillnet when the condition of the water conceals the snare. During the first months of the open season the river is always in flood and the muddy current obscures the net into which the fish in his eager progress bolts unaware. But when the current clears, as it does in July, or sometimes earlier, day-fishing is a profitless task. The stream has been known to be literally alive with salmon, and yet scarcely one could be taken while daylight lasted. By the time the night fishing begins, the warm summer season has arrived, and danger from storms is ordinarily past. If, however, the freshet is light, the day tides have to be abandoned much earlier, and the persistent intervals of bad weather peculiar to this region makes drifting about in the night anything but a pleasant occupation.

Gillnetters who sell their catches to the Astoria canneries do practically all their fishing on or near the bar, in close proximity to the jetty sands, Great Republic and Peacock spits. In the fore part of the season, hundreds of boats may be seen from the station at Fort Canby, rocking idly in the rolling swell, apparently in the very edge of the break. The object of the fisherman is to approach as near the outer break as possible, without actually getting into it. And right here is where nets are lost and lives are sacrificed.

The tide and tide-table often disagree. Local disturbances effect these changes. An apparently insignificant disparity of time and tide, the occasion of which is frequent and unavoidable, is to blame for many a fatality.

The two stages of tide known as "low-water slack" and "high-water slack" are most favorable for fishing. It is the fresh water of the Columbia that the Chinook salmon is seeking, and he is not to be turned from his quest. All other streams in that vicinity he ignores. Willapa harbor is not more than twenty-five miles from the mouth of the Columbia, and yet a genuine red-meated Chinook has never been caught in its waters. The same is true of Gray's harbor and Puget sound. The course of the vast schools on entering the river is directly against the current. When the tide ebbs the salmon all ascend, and with the flood, when the current sets in strongly from the sea, they turn about and swim back toward the harbor bar. There is always a period of from forty minutes to an hour at high and low-water slack, respectively, when the water is at a standstill, or nearly so, and what makes these stages best for fishing is that then, and only then, salmon dart about in every direction, searching persistently for the source of the fresh water. The absence of any current so bewilders them that a gillnet laid out in any position has the double chance of catching fish that happen to be on either side.

Gillnetters who fish on the bar, after delivering their catch at Astoria, calculate to leave port at a stage of tide that will enable them, when their nets are cast out anywhere below, to drift to the bar by low water. To accomplish this is simple enough, providing the net is laid out rightly, and the tide-table and your timepiece are correct. The tide-table is to the bar fisherman what the compass is to the mariner. A trustworthy timepiece he must have. It is customary to lay the net out at Astoria about half-tide, in order to