The Virginia Capes Operating Area, known as the Southern Drill Grounds to many Navy men, has been used for years as a sea school for firing exercises, experimental work, and training programs of the Atlantic Fleet. Scattered throughout these waters is another fleet, also hard at work, but on a different tack. These are the commercial fishing vessels which make up the southern fleet. The two fleets, naval and commercial, are often at odds with each other, one seeking a clear area for firing, the other hunting for fish.
The fisherman captain would have preferred a slight drizzle and a choppy sea instead of clear weather that morning, but he put his net over the side hoping for a large catch anyway. This region, called by fishermen the “Portuguese Hole,” is more properly termed Washington Canyon, and had been chosen because porgy and sea bass had been caught there for years during the winter months.
The six-man crew had gone below while the skipper maintained a lookout in the pilothouse searching the sky for sea gulls and gannets. He agreed with an old friend who had told him, “No birds, no fish.” Although many years had taught him that the law was not ironclad, birds were always a good sign, so he watched. Looming toward him was a large unfamiliar object flying much higher than birds do. It darted so suddenly towards the sea that he forgot his trawling for a moment and stared. The strange bird now seemed to be spinning and then he realized that it must be a plane. As it splashed into the sea he tried to spot a parachute, but could find none.
The fisherman sounded his horn summoning the crew to haul in the rig and jerked the throttle to full ahead, directing his vessel to the wreck. Arriving close aboard, he could detect no sign of life raft or preserver. The look of excitement on his face turned to despair, for he believed the pilot was surely lost. Telling him the plane was only a drone when he arrived in port the next day would not make the situation very humorous for him.
Recently a group of ships operating during LANTFLEX were confronted with clusters of vessels working with small boats to catch menhaden, a type of fish that swims near the ocean surface.
Yet the problem of fishing vessels is nothing new to the USS Mississippi (EAG- 128) which evaluates guided missiles in the Operating Area. For almost a decade now the Mississippi has experimented with gunnery equipment. Although area clearance has always been a problem, with the advent of the missile the problem has reached even greater proportions. With the drone group on station, weather clear and fire control stations manned, a small fishing craft suddenly appears on the edge of the firing area trawling at three knots. Firing is halted while the captain of the Mississippi attempts to maneuver to find a clear spot. This is annoying, for among other problems he must keep in mind the amount of time his planes can remain on station. Continually faced with this difficulty, the captain assigned the author to survey the area and “to find out where the fishermen are so we can steer clear of them”
The survey ranged from a visit to the Virginia Fisheries Laboratory to a seven- day cruise aboard the 100-foot commercial trawler Admiral. Intelligence agencies called the locating of fishing vessels an “impossible” task, but provided some clues for digging out information. The biologists at the state laboratory suggested that “general notions of fishermen” were the best sources for learning where fish are; but fishermen interviewed disagreed with each other. One veteran of twenty years as a fisherman was asked where he started each trip. “That question reminds me of the sultan who gave his son a hundred concubines for a birthday present,” he replied.
The issue of fishing vessels in the firing area is neither unique nor new. West Coast naval vessels steam far south of San Francisco avoiding frequent fog and heavy shipping lanes. Their new obstacles are numbers of fishing craft. Lobster pots in New England waters have worried many a Navy captain. Placed in bush channels, the pots become a hazard to navigation. In the Far East, Japanese officers vividly recall the large number of fishing vessels which plagued their navy during prewar training exercises.
Despite the seeming lack of knowledge on the subject, the Mississippi acquired some useful fishlore. Menhaden fishing and deep- sea trawling represent the two significant industries active offshore of the Virginia Capes. Of the two, the menhaden industry is the more lucrative.
Menhaden are valuable as fertilizer, cattle feed, and industrial lubricants. Their seasonal migrations from Chesapeake Bay and other inland waters control the operations of the fishing fleet. Patrolling the ocean generally inside the 20-fathom curve from the first week in June to late November, the menhaden vessels steam as far north as New England and as far south as the Gulf of Mexico. Since the menhaden swim so close to the surface, airplanes are useful as spotters to lead vessels to the swarming schools of this oil-bearing fish. After a spotter report has been received, a striker boat is sent out to follow the fish and mark their position. More small boats follow, heading for the front of the school. The purse seine, a cylindrical net, cages the fish and is then drawn closed by “purse strings.”
Since offshore trawlers are more numerous in the waters frequented by the Mississippi and other naval vessels in the winter, this article deals chiefly with the trawling industry. These trawlers are based at Hampton, Wachapreague, and other coastal towns of Virginia, and they number about sixty. Fishermen from North Carolina, New Jersey, New York, and even from Maine gravitate to the Virginia Capes during the cold season hoping to catch porgy, sea bass, and flounder (shorefish which have swum from Chesapeake Bay to the warmer offshore waters).
From the coast of Virginia extending outward sixty miles, the Atlantic Ocean bottom gradually slopes to 100 fathoms. Beyond the 100-fathom continental curve, the ocean dips to depths of a mile in a short distance, making trawling operations impractical. Inside this shoal, trawler fishermen drag their nets along shoals, ridges, sea mounts, and sloughs. As bottom fishermen, they feel that fish like to swim the ridges linking one fathom curve with another, and thus they trawl along the fathom curves. Another example of the importance of depth fishing is the method of circling certain sea mounts sprinkled throughout the Virginia Capes waters. A 15- fathom patch surrounded by nineteen fathoms on one side and 22 fathoms on the other may stock many porgy for a patient fisherman.
Scattered along the 100-fathom curve are several canyons which are frequently trawled for the fisherman hopes for sea bass at night around these canyons; during the day he may find porgy (also called scup). These canyons are identified as “Rockpile Hole” for Norfolk Canyon; “Portuguese Hole,” Washington Canyon; “Southern Bight,” Baltimore Canyon, and “Northern Bight,” Wilmington Canyon. The “Old Navy Dumping Hole,” an area ten miles south of Norfolk Canyon on one occasion netted 350 pounds of office furniture for the trawler Ocean Spray, as well as a substantial haul of sea bass. A group of shoals called the “Fingers” in fourteen to 23 fathoms located about fifteen miles east of Ocean City, Maryland, is carefully trawled. In the spring, the Winter Quarter Lightship waters have been fished successfully for flounder. “Jackspot,” a shoal nine miles to the north of the lightship, is a favorite spot for sport as well as commercial fishing.
Climate, weather, and season are important factors influencing the fish find. A typical cruise of the Admiral in the first week of February will illustrate. Limited by unusually cold weather and a sparse fish yield, this vessel trawled in two general regions. To the north, the Admiral fished from ten miles southeast of the Winter Quarter Lightship south to an area ten miles northwest of the Norfolk Canyon in 20-25 fathoms of water. To the south, the trawler worked from forty miles east of False Cape, Virginia, northward to within ten miles of the Norfolk Canyon in 40-45 fathoms of water.
Winds of 25-35 knots stirred the sea as vapor appeared on the surface of the waves; freezing temperatures frosted the decks, making topside work hazardous. One night when Captain Lewis Burroughs turned on the current for a string of deck lights, he noticed that icicles on the bulbs would not melt. He decided to “lay up,” or drift, for the night, swearing he would not fish under such conditions even if he were on top of a school of porgy that would flood the decks when hauled aboard. A visiting skipper on the Flo of Rockland, Maine, admitted aloud that there was some truth in the oath of Captain Burroughs. Declaring the weather to be “windy,” he also drifted that night.
When a trawler drifts, a man on watch is stationed in the pilothouse. Caution is the best policy for passing vessels, for this man may fall asleep. There are cases when two trawlers have drifted into collision. Midshipmen have been taught the maxim, “Red over white, fishing at night,” but the tricolored trawling light isn’t always clicked on when the gear is overboard. Captain Burroughs always looks for light bulbs on deck as the sure sign of a boat engaged in trawling.
The cold weather this past winter forced the trawlers to steam further offshore than usual. The previous year a warmer winter resulting in warmer ocean temperatures meant more inshore fishing.
As the reports on the fishing industry accumulated, the Mississippi took advantage of the information. Fishing vessels plotted on the chart showed a movement towards shore one day. A listening watch over the ship-to- ship frequency used by fishermen confirmed that heavy winds and a small catch were driving the vessels inshore. The next morning, the Mississippi steamed out sixty miles from Chincoteague and conducted firing exercises unhampered. Another day, fishermen chatting over the radio told us that porgy were found along the forty-fathom line east of the Winter Quarter Lightship, so the Mississippi laid down a course towards the coast.
Fishermen talk over the radio incessantly. One could lament the fate of a fisherman stationed in the solitude of his pilothouse were it not for the handset within arm’s length of the steering wheel. The radio has become the chief source of vital tactical information. Such questions as “Where are you located? Did you get any sea robin?” (non- marketable fish) can be heard. Lines of position, fathom marks, amount and kind of catch are transmitted day and night. For competitors, fishermen act charitably towards one another most of the time, but occasionally information is withheld. One fisherman, when desirous of telling a close friend that he is having good luck with porgy employs a special code so that others will not know. He especially wants wholesalers who listen avidly to the circuit to learn nothing of his big catch lest the prices fall because of too great a supply. Sometimes a fisherman will report he caught “only a handful” whereas in reality he can’t haul the fish aboard fast enough. Conversely, a fisherman was heard broadcasting that he had caught many bags of fish, when actually he had netted only a few.
The fisherman, of course, uses his radio for emergency situations when necessary. One day the Admiral lost the forward otter door, a 1,000-pound eight-foot wooden board which slides along the ocean bottom keeping the net open. Captain Burroughs called the skipper of the nearby Katherine and Mary requesting a new door. Her skipper replied with a quick yes. Five other trawlers listening in also offered help; one wanted to supply a new pair of doors for the Admiral. The Katherine and Mary rendezvoused with the Admiral and, in a scene similar to transfer-at- sea operations, burtoned the replacement onto the Admiral’s deck.
The bearded fisherman who navigated by soundings and used his fingers for parallel rulers has been replaced by a man who, though still bearded, hunts his fish with an intelligence system that gives him as much information as Combat Information Center gives the commanding officer of a destroyer. Described as a “fisherman’s dream,” by Captain Burroughs, loran enables him to steer away from a wreck and trawl within a specified locale. The fathometer is of equal aid because most fishermen think schools of fish tend to swim along the edge of a shoal. The Fishscope, a device based on the principles of sonar, indicates the depth fish are in as a vessel trawls. Some boats now have radar and depend on it during periods of reduced visibility. A few are equipped with automatic steering. The Admiral possesses a 65-watt transmitter which has crystals for two ship-to-ship frequencies (2638 kc and 2738 kc), a Coast Guard net, and the Norfolk and New York marine operators. To maintain all this equipment, the skipper himself generally tinkers with tubes and wires, believing that he is his own best electronics technician. In moments of desperation, however, when horndogs, skate, and sea robin have been bagged (instead of the profitable porgy and bass), a fisherman is liable to lose faith in his equipment. “The best tow I ever made was when I turned off the Fishscope, fathom machine and radio, set the wheel on a course, sat down on my stool, stretched my legs, took out a magazine, and lighted my pipe. In two hours we hauled in and had four bags of porgy,” observed one fisherman.
To catch bottomfish, fishermen use an otter trawl, a net system introduced by the English many years ago. A bag-like net, of about 75 feet in length and protected by a cowhide bottom, is dragged along the ocean bottom weighed down and kept open by otter doors. Merchant masters have often called a trawler asking, “How close can I pass you astern?” to which the trawler skipper replies, “Just as close as you please.” They answer in this way because the large amount of cable which is let out (a 3:1 ratio to the depth of water is used) from two spools on the deck winch descends more or less vertically from the stern. Vessels carry from 150 to 200 fathoms of cable.
Fishermen may use every modern technique to pursue a fish, yet some have neglected to provide even primitive comfort for themselves and live no better than their ancestors did. Perhaps the best feature of life aboard the Admiral was the excellent food. Apple dumpling, steak, hot biscuits, and grapefruit were on the menu. Living conditions on other vessels were less than adequate, and accommodations in general are still fairly limited.
For power and reliability the picture changes. The Admiral, representative of many trawlers, is equipped with a 270 hp. four-cycle diesel which gives her a maximum speed of eleven knots. A World War I subchaser, she once patrolled at a speed of eighteen knots with her gasoline engines and was equipped with Y-guns and depth charges. Shorn of these engines and now completely rebuilt, the Admiral can hold 100,000 pounds of fish. Other trawlers range from 65 to 80 feet in size, and some carry steadying sails. The Admiral jogs wearily even in moderate seas but has withstood hurricane weather well. When she drifts, she weathercocks stern first.
Most fishermen are pictured as rather gruff individuals shrewdly intent on making a fast dollar, and often rather intent on spending it with similar speed. The Admiral did not allow alcoholic beverages aboard, and in general, fishermen are family men who would rather go home than down to the bar for a wild spree after a week’s cruise. Perhaps the most striking characteristic of the fishermen is their cordiality. Captain Burroughs volunteered to the captain of the Mississippi, “Next time a trawler’s in the firing bearing, ask him to shift his position. I know I would be glad to oblige the Navy and so would my friends.” Consequently the Mississippi can count on less announcements of “Checkfire” thanks to the cooperation from the toilers of the sea off the Virginia Capes.