Newspapers / The Scottish Chief (Maxton, … / March 31, 1949, edition 1 / Page 14
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TSE SEB ^6t0$ dTTESE*? PAGE SIX ^ W^r*. X C THURSDAY, MARCH 31, 1949 Robeson County Fish Tales AS TOLD BY June mcintyre Shad Run Heralds Spring On Cape Fear river will .-.convert the .most in different. A lot of people who have eaten shad might not thing so, remembering the million bones to be encountered to get to the sweet meat. But a few people like Tobe can fillet a' shad to get them out, and there’s even a metter way. ' bones: thirty minutes (you’ll never make it) will make every bone fail clean. Tobe said it would, and proved it But he didn’t try to explain the mystery of the sowbelly smoke. “Eat, man,” said Tobe. "Ain’t no room for words in a man’s mouth in shad-eating time.” Hello Folks: Not much fishing news this week. It has been a most too cool. I was supposed to go last Wed nesday p. m., tout instead I set by the fire and rested and warmed. Cutlar Moore came along with a big tale about a big trout he caught in Florida, but as I have said before, Florida is out of my territory. However, Cutlar said he weighed eleven' pounds. Some trout, I’ll say. I have lots of inquiries about where and when to go fishing and all sorts of things. I had a man come to me the other day and say he wanted me to settle an argument for him. I told him I would if I could and he said some fellow was trying to con vince him that the rock fish, striped bass and channel bass and puppy drum was all the same species of fish. But he was all wet. The book says Rockfish and striped bass are the same and channel bass and puppy drum are the same. So I got him straight ened out all o.k. I spoke last week about my trip to Lake Waccamaw but I don't believe I have ever told you about the never to be forgotten trip to Lake Waccamaw. It hap pened a few years ago, the spring after there was so many big bears killed down around the Lake. Jack Pait, Big Joe Nicholson and my self went on a camping trip in the Lake. We went down on a Friday p. m., pitched camp away down in the edge of the Lake some threeor four miles from anywhere. We fished a little while that p. m., and we caught enough fish for supper, or that is, I did. If I remember right, Jack and Joe didn’t catch so many but any way, he had a plenty of fish to eat. Now, to get down to the sad part of this trip and this ain’t no fish story. T M. Burney and Earl Bryant told us befor ewe left for us to take the boat and come up to the village at noon Saturday, that they would be there to join us. So Jack, he goes up and got them. We fished Saturday p. m. and had right good luck. The wind was high and the Lake was rough as could be. We cooked supper and sat around camp and the water getting worse and worse all the time and we atelling all sorts of tales about the bears a-chewing up people all around in the woods and it. not sounding good to me, not a little bit. I The Bear Facts So away late that night Earl and Mr. T. M. decided it was time for them to go, so Jack, he told Joe he'would have to go with him to ride the front end of the boat on his return back down the Lake, that the water was too rough for cneto ride alone and for me to stay at camp and if a bear came, not to let him eat all our food. I up and says it would never hap pen, that I would go and ride the front end back on the return trip, but Jack said no, I was too light and too, I was scared of rough water, and besides the boat was too small to carry all five of us and was nothing to do but for me to stay and keep camp. I says it will never happen. So I walked out and took my seat in the boat ■and says, "lets go.” So I came and went, or whatever you'may call it, but what I want to get on your mind is that I did not stay to keep the bears run off and when we got up town to the car, I ups and come home. They all said it was a good thing that I was with a crowd of good fellows that would not tell cn me that I was scared of the bears and the first man I met on the street Monday morning walk ed up to me and said "Good morn ing. Mr. Bar.” So you see, somebody did some talking out of school. This is a shore-nuff true story. Will be see. ing y° u - By E. Carl Sing (State News Bureau) ELIZABETHTOWN.-When the winter’s been more than a man can bear, and it’s a long time yet to poke sallad time; when his spirit’s down and his innards weary—it’s shad time on th eCape Fear River. From mid-February to middle May, shy spawning shad ease up the ships’ channel 50 miles from the Atlantic Ocean to Lock Num ber One, 20 miles below this half- way port on North Carolina’s long, est inland river waterway. If the water is muddy-clear they swim deep—if it’s muddy-plumb they addles out of singht just under the surgid surface. In either case the only way to get them is with a shad net, 50 to 100 ft., 5% inch mesh gill net, a contraption developed over the years to take advantage of a spawn ing shad’s habit of reversing its course on striking an obstacle (thus entangling fins) and to set up the most enjoyable fishing yet devised by man. For a March catch of maybe seven 3-pound fat shad, including (if they are roes) seven pounds of shad-roe, a prop erly staffed shad fishing expedi tion takes three hours of floating down the river, 15 minutes of pow er-boating back up again. Of course, in March and April, when the big run is on, pulling maybe 30 or 40 fish out of the net can get to be work. But with a guide like Tobe Gill (63 year old Negro who "never did do nothin but fish, and won’t so long’s cat- fish sells at 35 cents a pound”), Cape Fear shadfishing out of Eliza bethtown is a day-long idyll of floating the river and lazying in the hammock on the shad shack porch waiting the call to shad-and- roe that forgets the sad winter and makes any kind of spring hopeful. Shad fishing is strictly a stag affair on the middle Cape Fear; shad-and-roe eating, on the other hand and in warm April weather, is often a community event. Like, wise, riverside eating is strictly man’s privilege, whether it’s direct ly on the banks or in the tiny shad shack on the bluff above. For a March party when the river is low and muddy-clear and the shad a-lazying up waiting for the right moon two boats with two men each are enough to add to the half-dozen likely already on the river. Good companions, be sides Tobe, should be good fish- men first, like Manley George, theater owner, and Morris Wood ¬ house, farmer when shad isn’t run ning; and good talkers, like say Norman McCulloch, newspaper publisher. Strictly for the eating, a county sheroff, a municipal judge, an oil jobber or two, and a soft-drink bottler help immensely. A big-enough boat can be toted down the steep steps at the lock site; Ruby Squires, keeper of the lock, generally can round up one of the slender, pointed, Squafe-cut- at-both ends Cape Fear canoes — Tricky for amateurs but easily handled in the currents. The dif ference between an outing and an outrageously hard job of work will be the outboard motor brought along or rented (if possible as Tobe says: "Gasoline is much less wearing than musclelene.”) At high water there’s a boat pier, in February a sandy beach. One man can handle boat and net, two sensible men will balance much better and get the net overside in a neat line, bouyed at each end by cypress goat stakes and in the middle by ten 4-inch squares rigged as (diamond) foats. Downstream, your "shad drift” cast is just that, with the net spread out beside the boat, one fisherman manning a guide oar or pole, the other hold, ing the net lone tight. Nine times out of ten, a di'mint will show a strike by standing up on edge; eight times out of nine in February it will be a snag, or trash. There’s no need of trying to persuade yourself it’s trash — you’ll look at that net every time throughout its length. In late March and most of April, and de pending on your “fish-eddy nose” (Tobe says), you’ll likely have to pull into the bank to unload shad from the net—and you’ll cus the day you went shad fishing before you’ve got ten shad fins disentang led from the linen mesh. Just as surely you’ll make only one drift cast in your whole life if you left the outboard motor at home. Downstream for a mile around the second bend is one hour of piscatorial seventh heaven, shad or no shad Upstream again for another cast is four minutes by hard-duty motor—by paddle it is two-and-a-half hours of excruciat ing muscle-torture which doesn’t really hurt until you stop rowing; by pole it’s a bent back for the rest of a natural life, whatever age attempts it. But even so, and even if only one shad comes to your $13 net, one drift cast on the river is worthwhile in the life of nay fish erman, and one shad feast by the Take along a naif-pound sow belly (fatback, not bacon or “strip ed side meat”), some salt, and a hinged wire grill. When a shad hits, pull in to the bank and dress the sleek 4-pounder on a stright slit. Rub in salt (pepper if you have it); then line both sides of the spread shad with thin but sub stantial strips and clamp the whole in the hinged grill. Hang the grill no a bush while you decide wheth- to grill the roe (if it wasn’t a buck or a hickory shad) and build a roasting fire in a roasting pit (scoop out the ground, or lay a couple of green logs paralled). When the fire is a good bed of coals, the grill strung over it on a bent bush, and aromatic smoke curls up over the shad from drip ping, spluttering fat pork grease, the miracle happens—twenty min utes close to the coals will bring out a spring-has-come flavor in the shad meat and loosen most of the The “ditty bag” used by Navy personnel has been in use since the first days fo sailing. Quickest Way The quickest wak to have the paper change is to bail us both address of your Hometown News- your OLD and NEW Addresses when requesting a change - - To Subscription Dept. Box 909 Lumberton, N. C. ^^'Tiiit''' ■- -fftSP' , I ^__. 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The Scottish Chief (Maxton, N.C.)
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March 31, 1949, edition 1
14
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