Competing use of marine space in a modernizing fishery: salmon farming meets lobster fishing on the Bay of Fundy

Coastal fishing communities are frequently portrayed as bastions of tradition at odds with the modernizing forces of technological change and industrial capitalism. This article examines this debate in the context of intensive aquaculture introduced into regions formerly dependent on the wild fishery, specifically with respect to the explosive growth of salmon farming in New Brunswick. New farm sites are large, often located within or close to traditional lobster fishing areas, which has motivated considerable opposition from local fishermen. This article presents findings from research on interactions between salmon farming and lobster fishing around Deer Island and Grand Manan, New Brunswick. Fishermen and salmon farmers are concerned about possible long-term effects of farm operations on marine environmental quality and lobster health, and many are concerned about the concentration of ownership and lack of local control over the aquaculture industry. The potential for physical displacement from traditional fishing grounds is real, but the actual impacts have been tempered by a combination of factors, including unusually large lobster catches in recent years; technological advances that have encouraged a shift in lobster fishing effort further offshore, away from salmon farm sites; and social accommodations between salmon site managers and those who fish     

Size Estimation of Kingsoldier Bream (Argyrops spinifer) and Evidence of Fishing Strategies

This paper provides regression formulae for size estimation of kingsoldier bream (Argyrops spinifer) from measurements taken on bones enabling the reconstruction of the size of fish present in archaeological samples. Bones of Sparidae are commonly recovered from archaeological sites bordering the Arabian Gulf, and, of the species within this family, kingsoldier bream are relatively abundant with the bones also easily identifiable. The marine environment where this fish occurs varies throughout its life cycle, and therefore the reconstructed size of the fish can be used to infer the types of location where past fishing activities took place. Comparison of the estimated size of fish caught from two Late Islamic sites on the northwest coast of Qatar, in combination with other evidence, has been used to indicate differing frequencies of fishing methods at the two sites. This variation in fishing is caused by the topography of the coast in the immediate vicinity of the sites with shallow waters providing a wide tidal zone at the northern of the two with an environment suitable for fishing with stone‐built intertidal fish traps (known in Arabic as al maskar). The topography of the coast at the southern of the two sites is steeper, and the settlement was an important trading port so the coast was utilised primarily as a harbour rather than a fishing ground. The supply of fish at this settlement was provided by fishermen more commonly using basket traps (gargoor) and handlines with fishing taking place from boats. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

The causes and impact of changes in fish stocks in the waters around Fair Isle during the twentieth century

Drawing considerably from records of fish catches made by the fishermen of Fair Isle during the 20th century, this article highlights the dramatic decline in fish stocks in the waters around the Isle. It argues that the major cause has been the continuous intensification of the commercial fishing industry outside Fair Isle. Assessment is also made of the socio‐economic and cultural impact on the community of Fair Isle, and means are proposed to retain and regain links with the sea.     

Hydrogeological Knowledge from Below: Water Expertise as a Republican Common in Early-Modern Venice**

This essay looks at early-modern Venice hydroculture as a case of episteme from below. The forms of water knowledge it developed were multilayered and collective in their essence and solidly rested on a social experiential basis that was rooted in labour (especially fishing) and practices (especially water surveying and engineering). In accordance with the city's republican esprit (and correspondent political values), its episteme emerged as the encounter and negotiation between various institutions and groups: the fishermen of San Niccolò in Venice, the practitioners of the water magistrature and political authorities. This essay explores the institutional settings of this water culture, seen as an instance of bottom-up epistemic construction. It especially addresses three historical instances: firstly, a seventeenth century program to map public waters in order to block their alienation for private fish farming; secondly, water officers’ interviews with fishermen aimed to assess the state of the lagoon hydromorphology and, thirdly, fishing regulations. Venice communitarian and circular forms of knowledge production are here contrasted to an opposite paradigm, which was embodied by the Galileian mathematician and Rome courtier, Benedetto Castelli. His interactions with the Republic of Venice on water management and his approach to hydraulic problems are revealing of an elitist and abstract understanding of scientific knowledge that guided political decisions from above without taking in any consideration the opinions of the ‘vulgar’. While his science was the expression of a top-down political epistemology, Venetian water knowledge was more egalitarian. It left room for exchange, inclusiveness and bottom-up codification; it valued the gathering of different experiences (including the fishermen's practical knowledge of their waters) and rested on a concrete and systemic (organicist) understanding of natural-anthropic processes.     

Late Holocene fishing strategies in southern Africa as seen from Likoaeng,highland Lesotho

The open-air campsite of Likoaeng in the eastern highlands of Lesotho, southern Africa, preserves an extensive record of fishing activity by late Holocene hunter-gatherers. This paper reports the results of the analysis of the enormous fish assemblage recovered from its excavation. Fishing appears to have become more important from the start of the late Holocene neoglacial, c. 1000 cal. BC, with people camping at Likoaeng to intercept seasonal spawning runs of two species, Labeo capensis (the Orange River mudfish) and Labeobarbus aeneus (the smallmouth yellowfish). The latter dominates in the lower part of the sequence, with the former becoming dominant after 560 cal. BC. As a result, the focus of occupation probably shifted from high summer to spring. Estimates of Standard Length show that some fish were significantly larger than historically recorded maxima, but there is no sign that human predation affected fish size. The massive quantities of fish taken suggest that people may have used seasonally predictable spawning events as a focus for social aggregation. While there is no evidence for fish being preserved or removed off-site, the strong focus on fishing at Likoaeng strengthens the case for intensified hunter-gatherer interest in freshwater resources in southern Africa during the late Holocene.     

近代苏南渔民贫困原因探究

随着苏南社会近代化进程的加快,苏南渔民生活水平却并未有任何提高,甚至比封建社会时期还要贫困。造成这种状况的原因有很多,其中,渔民渔业权的丧失,封建势力的盘剥,外来势力的掠夺和进行水产品倾销以及市场失灵等是主要原因。探究近代苏南渔民贫困的社会根源,对于如何改善弱势群体的民生或有一些启发。     

Use of Hoop Nets in the Mississippi River Basin

The use of hoop nets is an old method of taking fish in the Mississippi River system, dating back to the 1860s. Since its introduction, the hoop net has been the single most important fishing tool in these inland waters. Hoop nets are successful for two reasons: 1) they are very efficient at catching fish, and 2) they are ideally suited to the needs of the individual fisherman along rivers. Hoop nets also can be used in many different environmental situations and in all seasons. In studying hoop nets, one is examining a folk occupation that dates back well into the last century, and one that exhibits few changes in the last 100 years. The most important change in hoop nets has been the introduction of nylon twine. The use of nylon greatly simplified the lives of fishermen and allowed them to use greater numbers of nets, since nylon nets require little care or maintenance and they last a long time. As long as there is a demand for river fish, hoop nets will be used in America's inland waters, and folk fishing as a way of life will survive.     

Fishing gear from the Roman period in the Netherlands: An overview

This paper presents an overview of fishing gear recovered from Roman period sites in the Netherlands. Fish hooks, line sinkers, net sinkers, floaters, wickerwork fish traps, canoes with live wells and fish tanks have been identified. These artefacts provide additional insight into the widespread practice of fishing and thus of fish consumption during this time period and is a valuable addition to research on archaeological fish bone remains.     

Interpreting the expansion of sea fishing in medieval Europe using stable isotope analysis of archaeological cod bones

Archaeological fish bones reveal increases in marine fish utilisation in Northern and Western Europe beginning in the 10th and 11th centuries AD. We use stable isotope signatures from 300 archaeological cod (Gadus morhua) bones to determine whether this sea fishing revolution resulted from increased local fishing or the introduction of preserved fish transported from distant waters such as Arctic Norway, Iceland and/or the Northern Isles of Scotland (Orkney and Shetland). Results from 12 settlements in England and Flanders (Belgium) indicate that catches were initially local. Between the 9th and 12th centuries most bones represented fish from the southern North Sea. Conversely, by the 13th to 14th centuries demand was increasingly met through long distance transport – signalling the onset of the globalisation of commercial fisheries and suggesting that cities such as London quickly outgrew the capacity of local fish supplies.     

Power,Protest, Poaching,and the Tweed Fisheries Acts of 1857 and 1859: 'Send a Gunboat!'

Abstract

The Tweed Fisheries Acts of 1857 and 1859 were victories for upstream landowners over coastal and estuarine commercial fishermen. In the manner of the Game Laws, these class-based Acts placed the interests of leisured, sport-fishing anglers above those of the net-fishing communities at the mouth. The latter were severely disadvantaged, and the fishermen and their families often clashed with the River Tweed Commission's bailiffs and local police who tried to enforce the Acts' restrictive terms. In particular, the contraction of the autumn netting season to allow more fish into the upstream reaches had converted legal fishing into poaching and was met with open defiance. The inability of the Commissioners to prevent mass disobedience or provide enough bailiffs to enforce the law prompted a request to the Home Secretary for assistance, with a suggestion that the Admiralty supply a gunboat to protect the bailiffs and overcome the protests. HMS Ruby was despatched to Berwick in October 1861 for the close season, and a succession of gunboats followed over the next twenty years in an unprecedented deployment of naval force to support the civil authorities.     

Continuity Amidst Change: Village Organization and Fishing Subsistence at the Dionisio Point Locality in Coastal Southern British Columbia

Shifts over time in faunal representation in Northwest Coast archaeological sites have been viewed as reflecting changes in economic organization and social complexity. We use fish faunal data from the Parry Lagoon Midden (site DgRv-006) in the Salish Sea region of coastal southwestern British Columbia, Canada, to evaluate the relationship between change in subsistence strategies and community organization. We describe and compare fish assemblages recovered from a shell midden generated by habitation at two sequentially occupied village sites. The lower midden layers include faunal remains derived from the Marpole Period plankhouse village occupation at site DgRv-003 (1500 to 1300 cal BP), while the upper layers were generated during the occupation of a Late Period plankhouse within site DgRv-006 (1000 to 600 cal BP). We compare the two faunal records to ascertain if subsistence re-organization accompanied the social change associated with abandonment and later re-establishment of a village in the Dionisio Point Locality. Results indicate continuity of a diverse fishing economy for the two occupations, and therefore across the Marpole to Late Period transition. This study adds to the recent trend in Northwest Coast archaeology to reconsider the long-standing view that social and subsistence change necessarily occurred in tandem.     

The Sailing Vessels of Pensacola's Historical Red Snapper Fishing Industry: toward an understanding of construction trends

Commercial red snapper fishing dominated the Pensacola, Florida, waterfront around the turn of the 20th century. At the height of the industry, nearly 50 large schooners sailed from Pensacola, supplying demands for fresh fish across the United States. Using historical data from the List of Merchant Vessels of the United States and archaeological data from three probable commercial red snapper fishing schooner shipwrecks in north‐west Florida, this article traces build trends and characteristics among industry vessels from 1881–1930. Recognizing these developments may help identify other commercial red snapper fishing vessels among Gulf of Mexico‐area archaeological shipwreck sites.     

Plant use and crop husbandry in an early Neolithic village: Vaihingen an der Enz,Baden-Württemberg

Abstract

Rescue excavations carried out during the 1970s at the Iron Age hillfort of Broxmouth in East Lothian produced a small assemblage of fish bone. Despite some uncertainties surrounding the recovery of this material, recent analysis has produced highly unusual results. In particular, the presence of large specimens of ling and other species raises the possibility that the Broxmouth community was, at least periodically, engaged in deep-sea fishing. This suggestion is at variance with present understandings of Iron Age fishing strategies which generally envisage more expedient practices, such as line fishing from the shore. Indeed, it has even been suggested that the consumption of fish was avoided altogether in Iron Age Britain, for religious or cosmological reasons. The composition of the Broxmouth assemblage thus has potentially important implications for our understanding of Iron Age marine exploitation.     

Fishing for Fish and for Jaminyjarti in Northern Aboriginal Australia

Socio‐cultural and ecological literature about Australian Indigenous groups reveal that fishing is a vital part of everyday life for many groups who have customary and recreational fresh and salt‐water affiliations. This vitality exists and has meaning for families and communities in the Kimberley's Fitzroy Valley region of Northern Aboriginal Australia. Less well known, however, is the central part that fishing plays in jaminyjarti, a ritual that relies on close kin regularly catching, cooking and sharing fish for bereaved family members during the ‘sorry business’ time that emerges after the death of a loved one. What becomes evident is that while fishing is undoubtedly intertwined in the everydayness and sociality of life, it is also central to comforting the bereaved during and after the grieving process that accompanies death.     

Illegal fishing and Australian security

The security impact of illegal fishing is not well understood. Where illegal fishing is recognised as a security problem, the focus has been on fish as a natural resource, the depletion of which can have impacts on food security, individual livelihoods, and the economic survival of states relying on illegal fishing. We argue that a focus on fish as a natural resource obscures the other security challenges the crime of illegal fishing poses to Australia. As this paper explains, illegal fishing overlaps with drug, human, weapon and other contraband trafficking and smuggling; irregular maritime arrivals; and maritime piracy. In addition, like other easily transported, high value resources, illegal fish can fund insurgencies and other types of political violence. Understanding illegal fishing as a security challenge will improve Australia’s national security policy. First, it acknowledges fish as a vital natural resource, implicated in economic, ecological, and human security; second, it analyses how illegal fishing interlinks with other maritime crimes; third, it challenges the effectiveness of monitoring and enforcement of illegal fishing; fourth, it presents an opportunity for effective regional cooperation; and finally it highlights the benefits of regional cooperation in responding to illegal fishing.     

Archaeological evidence of fish in the diet of the garrison at the Berry Head Forts,Brixham (Torbay) 1794–1817, with special reference to European hake Merluccius merluccius

Abstract

Post-excavation analysis of animal bones recovered from late 18th-/19th-century military refuse deposits within the Berry Head Forts (Torbay, Devon, UK) has provided evidence for the inclusion of fresh fish in the garrison’s diet. European hake was the principal fish in the food rations of the ordinary soldiers whilst more expensive fish, notably turbot, sole and John Dory, was only eaten in the officers’ messes. Reconstructed lengths of the hake in the archaeological assemblage formed a distribution pattern very different from that plotted from data on modern trawler-caught hake, showing how much post-industrial commercial fishing activity has profoundly altered the age/size structure of modern hake stocks.     

The Nordic Shrimp Industry: state entrepreneurship,intellectual and industrial structures,c. 1895–1950

This paper focuses on the emergence in the 20th century of a fishing industry based on northern shrimp (Pandalus borealis) in Norway, Sweden, Denmark and Iceland. Development in these countries exhibited noteworthy common features that are examined and compared in this paper, which emphasizes the intellectual, political and industrial conditions that facilitated the expansion of the fishing fleets and processing industries. The diffusion of knowledge and technology was a necessary condition for the industry's establishment, both at a national and an inter-Nordic level. Central to these transfers of knowledge was the interaction between scientists and fisheries experts and fishermen and industrialists.     

The Difference that Class Makes: Neoliberalization and Non‐Capitalism in the Fishing Industry of New England

Abstract: Fishing economies are typically represented as pre‐capitalist and as a barrier to capital accumulation rather than as an alternative economy with its own potentials. Privatization (and capitalism) appears logical and inevitable because “there is no alternative” described or given. The class analysis presented here focuses on questions of property and subjectivity and describes fishing as a non‐capitalist and community‐based economy consonant with both a tradition of common property and an image of “fishermen” as independent and interested in fairness and equity. While the latter is associated with a neoliberal subject aligned with the capitalist economy, a class analysis of fishing repositions “fishermen” as community subjects aligned with a community economy.     

Re-investigating fish consumption in Greek antiquity: results from δC and δN analysis from fish bone collagen

One of the frequently encountered issues in ancient Greek dietary reconstructions through isotope analyses has been the apparent unimportance of fish protein in human diets. The significance of this observation is amplified by the abundant ichthyofaunal remains, iconographic evidence and literary information on fish and fishing, pertaining to almost all sites and time periods of Greek antiquity. In this project, we measured for the first time isotopes from a large number of fish bones from Greek sites dating from the Mesolithic to the Classical times, aiming to investigate whether this absence is an artefact of the methodology or whether it reflects a reality of restricted fish consumption. Results show that regional trends are stronger that temporal ones in fish isotope values. The range of values overlaps with terrestrial resources, making it difficult or impossible to reject fish consumption based on isotope data alone. This variability proposes a reconsideration of the amount of fish in ancient Greek diets specifically for each site and amplifies the importance of interdisciplinary studies, especially for regions with variable ecological resources.