Today was one of the best days of my life! I have been working on the boat since Tuesday (its Friday night now) and I can’t describe how good it has been so far. I have to start with today because its fresh in my memory, so you’ll have to bear with me. I’ll go back and explain exactly what my job entails after I try to put my day into words. I woke up this morning at 6:30 before my alarm clock had even rung, I’ll give you a minute to let that sink in…before, not just a minute but long enough to forget to shut it off for 15 minutes and still not hear the alarm. It’s a great feeling to want to get up. I still don’t want to get out of bed because its warm but once I get into the kitchen and get the coffee going I immediately start getting excited about going out fishing. To be fair the excitement doesn’t get to a fever pitch until I get to the top of the hill where my motorcycle is parked, the walk is a little painful but as soon as I fire up the Shenda the fun begins!
This morning wasn’t spectacular like several I’ve enjoyed so far but the air was crisp and it woke me up more than usual. The ride was great and upon reaching a new top speed on the bike on the way to the boat yard I knew that the day was going places. On top of that I arrived at the pier to see that Jamie (my skipper) had gotten there early and already mended the pots and started watering down the bait (I’ll explain later). Basically what t came down to was that I didn’t have to do a bunch of the shit work i would usually do before we set out. Once again an omen of things to come. We head out of the harbor and almost immediately noticed something on the horizon. As we got closer we saw the fins of about six basking sharks in the water. We managed to navigate close enough to one that we saw it swim past the boat almost within arms reach. Jamie estimated that it was 30 feet long. I know what you’re all thinking, “fisherman always embellish, it was probably closer to 15”. Let me just say that I shit you not, it was bigger than the boat!
After getting a good look at the sharks we got down to business, the first fleet of lobster creels is a set of 18 and they are the light ones so it’s a good way to get the blood flowing. We just had to get a few fleets out of the way before we were to take 40 creels on board to move them across the mouth of Loch to a new spot.
Looking across from Ardtun (the side of the Loch that most of our gear is on) to the Berg, where we are bringing about half the creels to put out.
We got a tip from another local fisherman (obviously he wasn’t a lobster man, he goes for shrimp) a few days before that there was some good ground along the dramatic shoreline of a geological marvel they call the Berg and so we had already moved several fleets of creels over. I had been around the Berg once before on another boat but I was excited to get up close and to be working along it for a few hours. It is undoubtedly one of the most amazing backdrops one could possibly hope to work in front of. The combination of the scenery coupled with my excitement about the potential catch was only adding to what had already been a day to remember. Imagine yourself as a 10 year old, sitting at the top of the stairs on Christmas morning just waiting to bolt down to tear into your presents, the anticipation coursing through your veins. This is the type of feeling I get as I watch the seaweed covered rope wind up onto the winch and then the iridescent blue of the creel as they surge to the surface. On this day the crab were coming up thick and fast, Jamie’s decision tol act on the advice was proving a good one. Sometime during the 2nd or 3rd fleet as I was stacking creels I heard “Ach, that’s a cracker!” and turned to see Jamie pulling an absolutely massive lobster out of the cage. It was the biggest one that we had caught since I started, weighing about 3 lbs. You know it’s a good one when the skipper who has been fishing for the past 20 years is grinning ear to ear.
King Kong lobster had left us in great spirits and the rest of the day was flying by. As we steamed back across the loch (about a 30 minute ride) eating our lunch I could feel the wind pick and the swell intensify. As we hauled the next few fleets the weather only worsened and the boat was starting to pitch back and forth as I scrambled from creel to creel trying to keep my balance as well as avoid being knocked senseless by a disembarking creel or having my finger severed by an angry crab (these little fuckers have pincers that you would not believe and once they latch on the only way to get them off is by way of the hammer). We had about 50 or 60 creels left on the day when Jamie looked out to the open ocean back down to the swell by the boat and said we were calling it a day. It wasn’t worth the risk just to get a few more creels on a day when the catch had already been so good. Fisherman tend to know to quit when their ahead in regards to the weather.
We packed up the last of the gear and began heading for home. Then came words from Jamie that I never expected to hear “It’s getting to rough for the auto pilot, I’ll cut the crab, take us home.” He was gesturing towards the wheelhouse and I realized that he actually wanted me to take the helm. There was no chance that I was letting this opportunity evade my grasp. I have literally been watching fishing boats steam all around the islands every summer and crashing through waves on stormy days for over 20 years and just wishing that I could be the one in the captains chair, and now here I was. I took the wheel and laid my hand down on the throttle, pushing it forward to 2,000 revs and feeling the power of the boat at my finger tips. I glanced to the wind monitor and watched as the wind speed increased to 25 mph. I recalled Jamie saying this was about the maximum wind he ever fished in and as the waves began to crash over the bow of the boat I realized why. Jamie peered in the window and said “How about some music?” He reached up and turned on the player, Lynard Skynard-Greatest Hits. Could this get better? As “Sweet Home Alabama” sounded out I was getting into the adventure and by the time “Simple Man” came on I was belting out the words at the top of my lungs. As each wave came the coat would rise over it before being lifted airborne for a split second and then crashing onto and through the next wave. These were the roughest seas I had ever been out on and I was driving right into the teeth of the squall. This was quite simply one of the best experiences of my life. I had no fear with the knowledge that Jamie was right next to the auxiliary wheel so he could bail me out of any trouble that I might get us into, but that was nowhere to be found in the cards. For the next half hour or so I felt like a cowboy at a rodeo and there were several occasions where the force of wave after wave and the free fall between literally lifted my off my feet.
This is the view from the little wheel house, obviously not on the day I am describing above...there was no way to use a camera in those conditions and the windshield wiper was working overtime.
The day that had rivaled any of the best I could remember experiencing still had one more glorious twist that would simply serve to solidify its excellence. We were out of the worst of the weather and safely inside the opening to the bay, where the headlands protected us from the brunt of the wind and waves, when the proverbial icing was slathered over the gourmet gateau that had been my Friday. “Ach, tomorrows no looking very nice, we’ll just have the weekend off.” Typically fisherman fish at least 6 days a week, weather permitting, with Sunday being the general choice for a day off. So to hear the words “weekend off” caught me off guard and they were exactly what my tired and aching body needed after my first week as a lobster fisherman.
I’ll now try to explain what my job entails day to day. Experiences from the first 3 days (before Friday) will serve to paint a picture for you all. After my daily commute (involving walking up the hill to my bike and then the 20 minute ride to the boat yard)I arrive at the boat yard around 8 o’clock to meet Jamie. We bring down the gear from his truck (usually a couple of creels he wants to fix, the bait and some diesel for the boat) load it into the dingy and motor out to where the Arianna is moored. At 20 feet in length Arianna is one of the smallest fishing boats on the Ross of Mull (for those who don’t know Mull is the island that Erraid is off of) but she is wide and stable. There is enough room for the two of us, 4 boxes for the 3 types of crab and also the lobster that we catch and space to stack as many as 50 creels at the back of the boat. I leap onto the boat and tie the dingy up as Jamie hands the gear to me onboard. He then sets about getting the engine going (involving checking fluids, electrics and mechanics) while I start watering the frozen scad we use as bait. I then join Jamie, who by this point is busy mending holes in creels. He has taught me the knots that every fisherman knows and although I have not mastered them all flawlessly the one I do know the best is that used on the creels. Jamie can mend 2 or 3 creels to my one but I am getting better each day and even started getting nods of approval from Jamie over my work, instead of the first day where he had to step in to help me get each bit started. Once the bait fish are thawed enough that I can separate them I begin cutting each fish in half. This takes me 10 minutes or so and by the time I’m done we have steamed out of the harbor and are getting close to the spot where the first fleet of creels is set.
Jamie, my skipper, mending a creel at the back of the boat. This is probably about 40 creels stacked, it gets hairy when we have to get all of these out within about 5 minutes.
A fleet of creels typically consists of between 10 and 20 traps spaced at distances of either 5 or 7 fathoms (a fathom is the length of a man, which has been set in stone at 6 feet). They are all attached to a long rope (maybe a hundred meters or so) by smaller ropes that are about a fathom in length. We wind them in on a winch with Jamie at the controls and as they come over the side he throws them onto the rack attached to the side of the boat. One of us unlatches the door and we begin to pull out whatever creatures have been trapped. We separate the crabs into 3 boxes for the three types we keep. There are green crabs, which are the standard shore crabs that live around the seaweed and rocks in the shallower waters and fetch the lowest price. I believe they are used for crab stock. Next we catch velvet crabs, which are very fast and have legs shaped almost like oars so they appear to be running through the water, also often used in a nice soup. Finally the big guns are the brown crab, which can grow very large and have claws that can sever a mans finger down to the bone. Each crab prefers different types of bait. The velvets and greens like the frozen scad and mackerel and the browns salivate over the dog fish we occasionally use. We don’t buy dogfish as bait but often catch them in the creels and chop them up to use as fresh bait for the browns. The lobsters like it all but I’m told by Jamie that they especially go wild for Octopus and Conger Eel, neither of which we have caught to use yet but Jamie assures me we will eventually.
A box of very subdued brown crab, the goal is to fill about 2 of these fish boxes with browns in a day. You can't see the claws on these ones but trust me when I say they are frightening.
My primary role is that of baiter/stacker/thrower, which basically means that I do everything with the pots while Jamie mans the winch and steers the boat. Once a pot is unloaded and baited I seal it back up and carry it to the back of the boat to stack. After we bring in as many fleets as we are moving at once (usually between 1 and 4 at a time) we get ready to set them out. I stand at the loading platform on the side of the boat with the first creel in one hand and the buoy (that’s a float) in the other. Jamie typically gives me one of a few shouts to start letting them out: “Bombs away”, “As she comes” (which means I am to drop the first creel as the rope tightens after the buoy is in the water), a simple “Aye, now” or “let her go”. I get some others as well but these are by far the most prolific and all in a wonderfully thick Scottish accent. Nothing tickles me more than when I get the most Scottish of Scottish phrases out of Jamie: “ach aye”. Simply meaning the affirmative “oh yes” or something close to that and although it could be clichéd to say for some people when it comes from Jamie it just sounds right…not sure but that might be due to the fact that he’s actually Scottish.
Once I’ve launched the first creel I am at full work speed. I have approximately 10-15 seconds between the time I let go of one creel until the time the rope will come taught and rip the next creel from the stack and send it catapulting over the railing, taking anything it hits with it. This is one of the most intense things I have ever done. The boat is moving forward and the line of creels is moving backwards against it. Each creel weighs between 25 and 50 lbs. and once you have a couple in the water the force on the rope is incredible and far exceeds the strength of a man. So if you don’t have your shit together you risk serious injury to yourself or anyone else on the boat. On my second day (Wednesday) I experienced one of the worst nightmares a fisherman can have…
I was somewhere in the middle of a fleet of 10 creels and had just launched another over the side when I felt something sliding around my foot. I looked down to see with horror that the rope had looped around my boot. As it tightened around my leg I felt the pull of the half dozen creels already beneath the surface. I grabbed the rope and tried to take the strain, which was quickly becoming more than I could handle. By this point my initial yell had alerted Jamie and he was already in crisis mode slamming the boat into reverse and leaping to my side. His quick action took the force of the boat moving forward off the rope and gave me just enough slack and time to free myself from the loop as the next creel came bumping across the deck towards me. It was all I could do to partially catch/fend off the creel and direct it over the side. I could tell even Jamie was a little shaken and since we have been much more careful. It was basically just my inexperience here and I have learned from the mistake…but it scared me shitless!
Near death experiences aside things on the boat are great. We work harder than I’ve worked at any job in my life but I have more fun at the same time so it really doesn’t bother me. I only really think about it when I’m sitting at the Croft feeling the aches, cuts and bruises that I picked up from the day. In a given 8 hour day out on the boat I would estimate that we are flat out working for at least 7 hours. The only down time is when we are going between fleets but since most fleets are set one after another this is not usually more than a few minutes at best. The only exception is when we steam across the loch to the Berg. I wear the full yellow oil skin outfit with steel toe rubber boots and gloves and I am thankful for every inch of the uniform. It protects me from the wind, rain and most importantly the claws! Having said that if one of the big crabs or lobsters wanted to bite through my gloves and I wasn’t paying attention he could easily put me in a lot of pain.
The remainders of the daily tasks come as we head for home. We have to “claw” the crabs and “band” the lobsters. The latter is very self explanatory and you’ve all seen the resulting lobsters sitting in the shops with rubber bands holding their claws shut. The former is less clear and a skill that took me several days (and hundreds of crabs) to master. Basically in order to store the crabs for the week before we sell them to the buyers we have to sever the tendon that allows their claws to open and shut. For this one must take the crab and, being very wary of the other claw, force open one pincer and with a knife quickly cut the tendon. Its hard to get them to open wide enough and hard to find the right part to cut but once you get it there is a most satisfying pop and the top part of the claw goes limp. It sounds barbaric but I am assured by several sources that the crabs are unaware of any issues and based on their behavior (which doesn’t change at all post “clawing”) I would tend to agree with that. After all the crabs have been clawed and the lobsters banded we add them to cages that are kept on the ocean floor near the boat mooring until we land the catch, which will be happening tomorrow. It’ll be another first for me and I’m excited to see how our haul was for the week and how the process of selling to the whole seller goes. The key, Jamie tells me, is to put the nice big crabs and lobsters on the top of the box for the buyer…perceptions are everything!
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