Fabulous Fish Catches

Controversy over limitations of commercial fish netting reminds us that the oldest business in Charlotte Harbor is dwindling fast. The fertility of Charlotte Harbor in this century is attested by Rev. George Gatewood, the earliest preacher in Southwest Florida. When he was 80 in 1944, he set down his memories of the early fishing industry. Gatewood's recollections were first printed in the Punta Gorda Herald, then collected into a slim but informative booklet "Coconut Coasts" now long out of print. His account needs no elaboration.

Carl "Sand Brim" Jones was about 5 feet 4 inches tall, of medium build with his full share of freckles. He got his nickname from a species of small fish. He was a fisherman, and his father before him was a fisherman --- not for sport, but for a living. Sand dwelt a large part of the time on a house-boat or in a shack beside the bays about Charlotte Harbor.

As this is written (1939) he and his family are on a house-lighter barge) with SEA BREEZE painted on the roof in box-car letters. It is anchored near the city docks of Punta Gorda (now Fishermens Village).

Sand Brim is young, has a wife and two little Brims --- with the prospects of an ever-increasing school each year. He hasn't had much book learning, but he learned how to fish as soon as he was big enough to paddle a boat. Why worry over an education when the waters are full of fish, oysters, clams, scallops, shrimps, turtles, conchs and numerous other eatables that can be had for the taking?

Sand Brim couldn't see the wisdom in spending 12 years of the best part of his life for something that when you got it, you didn't know what to do with. Of those who have it, most couldn't tell a jack-fish from a pompano. He was content and happy with his little flock on the Sea Breeze and didn't worry about what he didn't know. But sometimes food on the Sea Breeze got a little scarce, and one gets tired of eating one kind of food continuously.

Bill Smith said Sand Brim had eaten so many fish the fins were growing out his back. He couldn't wear an undershirt because he couldn't pull it off over his head.

Sand Brim usually ran a stopnet crew consisting of six or seven men. Then he would have to rent a house ashore for his family because the Sea Breeze was only big enough to accommodate the fishermen, with no space to spare. Nets were put out at high tide, while fish feed over shoal water, and drawn in at low tide. Sometimes the nets extended for a mile or more from one island to another. Fish could not get back to deep water. Ends of the nets were brought together so that the fish were completely penned. Fishermen continued to make the loop, or pen, smaller and smaller.

When the fish were crowded together, the bottom edge lead-line would be pulled under the fish. If the net was deep enough, the men fastened the lead-lines together under the fish and propped up the top edge cork-lines with stakes. This way, the fish could not jump over.

One Haul, Several Scows

Then the fishermen pulled a scow or large skiff alongside the net- pen and dumped the fish into the boat. Sometimes one haul of fish would fill several boats or scows.

I was working once with Sand Brim's father, who had a crew of seven men, when he caught 12,600 pounds of fish at one haul of the nets. It took us from daylight that morning until midnight to gather them up and get them into the ice house. Most of the fish were mullet, which are very desirable. However, there were many trout which bring a better price than mullet. Also, there was a sprinkling of other kinds of eatable fish. That was an unusual catch, but not as large as some others that have made.

T.C. Crosland, formerly one of the Punta Gorda wholesale fish dealers, says Emmett McEver, captain of a fish crew in 1916, caught 76,000 pounds of fish with one haul of his nets. More than 21,000 pounds of mackerel were brought up on the same day by another boat. That day, Crosland shipped five box-car loads of 20,000 pounds each. He paid one and one-half cents a pound for the mullet and sold them F.O.B. at two cents a pound. In that year, from September 1 to Nov. 30, Crosland averaged shipping five carloads a week.

In 1926, Capt. Roy Adams on one trip, brought up on Crosland's boat Sea Belle 87,000 pounds of Spanish mackerel --- and Mr. Crosland represented only one of the wholesale fish dealers operating at Punta Gorda. Fishing was the main industry for many years.

Sand Brim usually anchored the Sea Breeze conveniently behind some sandbar so heavy seas in an ordinary blow could not reach it. Yet, the anchorage could be reached by small boats and was out from land far enough so mosquitos would not to be too thick.

There are three kinds of commercial fishing in the bays and passes on the southwest coast -- stopnet, gillnet and hook-and-line. Sand Brim used the stopnet most of the time, although he sometimes used the gillnet. The stopnet has smaller meshes and stronger twine. When you once get the fish surrounded, or cut off from deep water, there is no way for them to get out but to jump over the cork line. Some do, but not enough to seriously affect the catch.

Pound Nets

There is another mode of fishing in these waters besides the ones mentioned. That is called poundnet fishing. It is done in the open Gulf, usually off the mouth of some pass. These nets are very strong and funnel shaped -- supported by piling sometimes 40 to 60 feet long and sunk in the bottom of the Gulf deep enough to hold them firm.

Fish going on regular runs toward the pass, strike the flaring wings of this net, are guided down the funnel into the net and are unable to find they way out again.

In 1921, The Bright Eye Fish Company of Punta Gorda built and operated such a net off Boca Grande pass and caught great quantities of fish in it. At one trip they brought home 45,000 pounds of mackerel and 5,000 pounds of bonito on the boat R.W. Powell. Capt. Fred Quednau and his brother, Will, engineer, will vouch for this statement.

Capt. Fred Quednau is the present mayor of Punta Gorda. Charles Bodiford, a deck hand who helped handle the fish, also lives in Punta Gorda. The storm of 1921, shortly after the big catch, destroyed the poundnet and its fixtures, discouraging the company which ceased operating at that point.

Quednau tells about two other remarkable catches of fish. One was a haul made by Ike Riggs and others near Blind Pass when over 250,000 mullet by actual count were taken. The other haul was made by Emmett McEver and M.R. Goulding near the north beach of LaCosta Island. This yielded over 100,000 pounds of mullet by actual weight when delivered to the shipping point by the run boat Chase.

Quednau relates that off Cape Romano he once saw 50 acres of redfish where the water was about 25 feet deep. So many were there, the fish at the surface were lifted up by those below. This created the appearance of a coral oyster rock rising slightly above the water.

James Willis and his crew are said to have made a haul of mullet recently in which 600 jumped over the net and landed in the boat that lay alongside. Fishermen placed their boats where they expected most of the jumping to take place.

Author: Lindsey Williams