8.14.2011

The Josie J, 08.11


Well the last few days have been pretty eventful.

I have found myself working on a fishing boat!  A purse seiner, to be specific. Here’s a picture:




















I left Tenakee on the Josie J on Monday. The first day we were off, so I got to sit back and enjoy the best whale watching cruise I’ve ever taken. Then we fished for two days. And, finally, we tied up in Baranof, a tiny little town (?) with hot springs and my eternal affection. Pictures coming.

The fishing is fun. It’s hard, and I’m not good at it yet, but I’m catching (ha!) on. Captain Ron has been going pretty easy on me so far. He’s got me stacking nets, which isn’t easy exactly, but it’s pretty simple. A purse seiner sets out one huge net, pulling it out with a skiff (Dennis) and then pulling it back in with a mechanical winch. As it comes in, we stack it on the deck so that it doesn’t get tangled. One guy (Ryan) piles the cork line, which is what keeps the net floating. One guy (Sean) piles the lead line, which is the heavy line that sinks. And I am working in the middle, stacking the net and making sure it stays out of their way. The difficulties are mainly in handing the net, which is working my arm muscles pretty hard, and in dodging the jellyfish that come through the block like a rainstorm sometimes. Right now, at the end of each set, I’ve got tired arms, a stinging face, and lumpy piles, but I’ll get better!

I can’t take pictures while we’re working, but here are two other seiners at work.

































You see the guy in the middle wearing the black rainjacket? On the Josie J, that's me.

That skiff pulls out one end of the net and then the two boats come together to close it up. Then, the skiff hooks onto the other side and tugs, because when the catch is good it can tip the boat pretty far over when we pull it in.

Here’s a picture of the net all stacked up. I’m pretty sure I took this photo before I did any fishing, which is they the pile’s so neat. It’s the product of someone else’s work. That’s Ryan sitting on it.




















Finally, we pull up our catch and pour it into the hold. Meanwhile, Dennis hooks his skiff onto the other side of the boat and pulls out, because when the catch is heavy the boat can tip pretty far over. When it’s a good catch, we repeat. When it’s not, we go look for more fish elsewhere. This, we repeat over and over for as long as fishing is open (2 day cycles this season), hopefully catching lots and lots of fish.

When the hold is full—it’s full of refrigerated seawater that keeps the fish cold—we raft up to a bigger boat that’s called a tender. Their big vacuum tube sucks all the fish out of our hold, and we hop over to their deck and sort through the salmon, separating kings, sockeyes, chums, and silvers out of the piles of pinks because they’re worth different amounts per pound. For a girl who was squeamish about handling the fish we caught last month, I was surprised how fun practically swimming in thousands of pounds of fish was. I think the allure of a paycheck has something to do with the attitude shift.

2 comments:

  1. Where are the days that you refused to put the salmon in the oven since it was too slimy?

    ReplyDelete
  2. I wish I could take photos at the tender when we're sorting fish! Imagine me practically swimming in thousands and thousands of pounds of salmon.

    ReplyDelete