Glossary of United Kingdom fishing gear terms

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tinuously vigilant over their young. In E. macuiatus, only one member of the pair cares for the young at a time. In the next paper, the causes of habitat segregation among adults of four species of sticklebacks are examined in a salt marsh by J.P. Worgan and G.J. FitzGeraJd. They find that there is a slight separation in breeding periods among the fishes and the role of interspecific competition is discussed. Tie last paper deals with the strucb~re of a temperate reef fish community in King Harbor, California. Diversity in this artificial habitat is believed to be related to its ecotonal nature and the fish community structure appears to be the result of a non-equilibrium process. The large species present at any particular time are the result of larvae that have successfully dispersed. It is the random fluctuations in these highly fecund species that result in much of the observed diversity. The remaining 16 pages contain 43 abstracts of papers presented at the meetings. The papers included in this volume highlight the areas where emphasis is currently being placed in the study of the behavior and ecology of fishes. In the search for the selective prc,sures that have been responsible for the evolution of social behavior, attention is focused on a species’ predators and prey. Additionally, both intra- and interspecific competition still attract a few investigators as areas worthy of understanding. The determinants of multispecies structure in coral reef communities dso continues to challenge investigators. One area that is not covered in this volume is the behavior of the open ocean fishes. Perhaps this is because of the extreme difficulty encountered in observing fish behavior in the open sea. I recommend this volume for the specialist in fish behavior or ecology, and for others who may wish to understand the state of these sciences better. R.L. WYMAN (Biology Department, h’urtwick College. Oneo.h, NY 13820, U.S.A.)

U.K. FISHING GEAR TERMS Qlossary of Utiited Kingdom Fishing Gear Terms. J.P. Bridger, J.J. Foster,

A.R. Margetts and ES. Strange. Fishing News Books, Surrey, 1981, xi + 114 pp., 33 illus., C15, + 11.50 post/packing, ISBN 0-85238-119-O. This excellent reference has been much needed for a long time. It fills a very real gap in fishing gear references and is sure to find its way onto

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the bookshelves of most, serious, fishing gear technologists. The title very modestly restricts the scope to the United Kingdom but, of course, there are implications wherever the English language is used. The authors have made what appears to be a very thorough survey of contemporary usage of fishing gear terms in the United Kingdom. They can be forgiven this somewhat parochial approach because a worldwide survey of Englishlanguage fishing gear terminology would have been prohibitive. However, it is unfortunate that they have not referenced other documents containing terms and definitions for fishing gear, such as the relevant IS0 Standards and the three-language glossary without definitions in the FAO fishing gear catalogues. The scope of the terminology is restricted to fishing gears which actually enter the water. Terms which relate to specialized deck equipment, etc., are not included. The ordering of the information which the authors collected has some very excellent features. Naturally, the terms are listed alphabetically for ready access. Where more than one term is used for the same feature, a “preferred” definition, The type of gear with which each term is assoonyms are entered using lower case letters and their definitions simply cross-reference to the preferred term. This practice not only reduces the space required for definitions, but also is an influence toward standardization of terminology and improved communication. Hopefully, such a reduced confusion of terms would not be accompanied by reduced colour in fishing gear language. If a term or meaning is used only in a relatively restricted geographic area, that locality is identified. If the same term is used with different meanings in different localities, then all definitions are given against their respective localities, usually with indication of the “preferred” definition. The type of gear with which each term is associated is listed in a separate column. This not only helps to orientate the reader quickly, but also permits shorter and more succinct definitions without loss of information. If the same term is used with different meanings when referred to different types of gear, then all definitions are given against the respective gears. Last, but not least, are the illustrations which are collected at the back of the book. Where appropriate, definitions make reference to these illustrations by number. Recognizing that “a picture is worth a thousand words” the book would, indeed, be large without these illustrations, and would be much more difficult to comprehend. There is one common, and perhaps forgivable, spelling error, even for the U.K.: otter boards and kites produce a sheering (not shearing) force, acting at right angles to the direction of travel and diverting the lines to open the gear. This is different from a shear force or stress which acts parallel to and in the plane being considered, as when cutting. Scissors shear the lines, but hydrofoils sheer the lines. This error occurs in sheerboard link and in the definitions of backstrop link, kite, and otter board. It must be categorized with the contentious spelling of “bating” which this glossary corrects. Bating is a characteristic of trawl nets and seine nets which are not baited.

Figure 24 goes a long way towards clarifying the confusing terminology related to shackles, but this ordering is not carried consistently into the text. It might be better to identify shackles primariiy according to shape and pin type, and then to relate various applications to this identification. In this way “Anchor shackle” would be defined as a BOW SHACKLE WITH EYE PIN. Incidentally, it is not a D-shackle as indirectly implied by the original definition. “Bracket shackle” would be defined as a Heavy BOW SHACKLE WITH SQUARE HEAD PIN “Cable shackle” is defined appropriately except that reference should be made to Fig. 24. Inin CABLE JOINING SHACKLE seems cidentally, the word “joining” somehow redundant and, if not, then why not also “chain joining shackle”? “Chain shackle” would be defined as a D-SHACKLE WITH EYE PIN (it is not synonymous with “Cable shackle”). “Danleno shackle” and “Ross (bobbin) shackle” would be more fully defined as a V-SHACKLE WITH SQUARE HEAD PIN . . “Flush pin shackle” and “Square head shackle” are defined appropriately. “Warp shackle” would be more fully defined as a Heavy D-SHACKLE WITH SQUARE HEAD PIN . . . , and it may be worth adding the term “trawl shackle” defined as a BOW OR D-SHACKLE WITH SQUARE HEAD PIN. Finally, in the definition of SHACKLE, the cross-reference should include TI-SHACKLE as well as D-SHACKLE and BOW SHACKLE. Still on hardware, in Fig. 25, “Bulldog” grip used to be a trade name and it is not very descriptive to the uninitiated. It would he more appropriate to call it WIRE ROPE GRIP as is done in U.K. catalogues. Further, Fig. 25 would be even more useful if it also contained drawings of a Norse1 link, Swing link, Eye bolt and Ring bolt. SWING LINK needs to be added to the glossary and, for the definitions, EYE BOLT and RING BOLT are not synonymous as indicated. An EYE BOLT has a fixed eye at its head, whereas a RING BOLT is an eye bolt with a loose ring through its eye. In relation to trawl terms, it would be useful if the BACK PLATE and BACK CHANNEL were both identified in Fig. 19 as features of otter boards, and I must disagree with the selection of “channel plate” as the “prefened” term. This term is an anomaly. In standard engineering parlance, a plate is flat whereas a channel has a U-section, and this term does not refer to the location of the channel on the back of the otter board. Surely the term FOOTROPE is widely enough used to warrant capitals, and the definition of GROUNDROPE should include chain as well as wire rope as common materials. The RUBBER SPACER should be identified as being for the groundrope, and HALF EGG deems more descriptive than HALF SHAPE for bunt and wing bobbins. Incidentally, it would help to show a few of these latter in use in Fig. 14. The LARGE BRACKET should be identified as being on an otter board. The definition of LEADLINE would be clearer if the last part read “as distinct from threading the lead weights directly on the sole rope”. The definition of OVAL OTTER BOARD

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should mention the possibility of camber as well as slots, and a more modern design might be better for Fig. 20. Also, addition of the term POLYVALENT OTTER BOARD would be useful. The definition of LOWER PANEL does not include the codend, but all the figures referenced do. Should it be included? The terminology relating to the aft frame lines of a trawl need further clarification, particularly in relation to Fig. 9. Strictly speaking, the BELLY LINE is on the belly only from the lower quarter to the lestridge. Often the same piece of cordage extends aft along the rib to the codend as shown. However. if thz KIBLINE runs the full length of the side of the net from the codend to the wing tips, as when tbrre wing legs are used, then the rib line is &lot synonymous with the belly iin~ as indicated. Further, if the rib line is made of wire or combination rope then it could hardly be called a BOLT ROPE. After all, BOLT ROPE is borrowed from the sail maker and is cordage. Finally, “Vigneron Dahl” (VD) gear is a specific bridle rig, which 1 believe was originally patented, involving a danleno. butterfly or pony board, and hence does not include all BRIDLE GEAR. In relation to fishing gear textiles (twines, netting and cordage), it is good to see a clear distinction between NET and NETTING. Recognition of this distinction will make communications much easier. On the other hand, the term “Mesh size” is ambiguous, leading to confusion, and should be complemented by definitions for MESH LENGTH and MESH OPENING as per IS0 prececnt. BIGHT has a standard dictionary definition in relation to rope which should be given, and CORDAGE should be defined as fibre rope. A CLEAN MESH does not have to be on the selvedge. Any T-cut which has been cleared of excess twine forms a clean mesh, as in a taper cut or mend, and in Fig. 1 it would have been more appropriate to identity the MESH on the upper or lower selvedge rather than on the cut end to help distinguish between mesh cuts and point cuts. N-CUT, T-CUT, POINT CUT, MESH CUT, and TAPER CUT should all have been defined. Also in Fig. 1, the A-direction could be interpreted as the one on the left and the B-direction as the one on the right, whereas they are both A-B DIRECTIONS. A SELVEDGE is not any edge of a piece of netting. Cut ends and tapers, particularly across the general course of the twine in the netting, are not selvedges. The selvedges are the clean sides of a strip of netting in the T-direction. A DOUBLE SELVEDGE is formed when two twines or netting yarns are introduced together into the edge of the strip of netting, and not ES defined. A selvedge is a stable edge so that, in that sense, a cut end or side can be “selvedged” by sewing a selvedge twine onto all the knots to keep them from untying. In the definition of MENDING SQUARE, the twine size as well as the netting dimensions and mesh size should be called for. In the definition of SEIZED, the concept that seizing secures the lines is missing and t’ie seizing agent may more appropriately be identified as twine or yarn. “Cordage” usually refers to rope. Similarly, mention of thcl function of SER’JFD would help

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clarify the definition. Finally, in relation to Fig. 2, IS0 uses the term SEWING in place of JOINING UP ROUND, and it seems more appropriate. These comments are not intended to denigrate this reference. Rather, they are intended for consideration in a second edition when the present stock runs out. Obviously, a great deal of very careful work and good ideas have gone into the preparation of this glossary. I am sure I will use my copy extensively. P.J.G. CARROTHERS (Dept. of Fisheries & Oceans, Biological Station,

St.Andrem.

N.B..

Canada)

TO FISH FOR FOOD, NOT MONEY Words of the Lagoon: Fishing and Marine Lore in the Palau District of Micronesia. R.E. Johannes. University of California Press, Berkeley, Los Angeles, London. 19SY., 245 pp., ISBN o-520-03929-7. An admirable book. My first impression of it, quickly turning its pages, was that it would have a place on the shelf alongside Homell’s “Fishing in Many Waters” and the several others of the kind, that stand as glosses to the encyclopaedic works on fishing gears published on behalf of FAO. Closer study of this work, however, and a rea.ding of some of the author’s scientific papers, persualed me that “Words of the Lagoon” could take a place in a small set of works which to me are classics, presenting some of the best of what I understand to be fisheries science. The nature of this set of books is at once indicated by naming Raymond F&h’s “Malay Fisherman” and Michael Graham’s “Fish Gate”. The literature of fishing and the lore of aquatic life is immense, from Aristotle through the ages, remarking Isaak Walton on the way. Much of it is obsessed hobby stuff, replete with esoteric detail of gear or place or prey; most of it is highly specialised. My “classics” are larger and more substantial, in almost every way: and, above all, they are human in a deep sense, not merely by ravealing the frailty of humanity. The arrangement of the material of “Words of the Lagoon” has nothing of the pseudo-objectivity that marks many technical papers, nor anything of the contrived logical construction of a tendentioun argument. Johannes describes how he went to Palau and iived among the fishermen to learn from them about their practices and to gather from them their knowledge of the sea and its fishes. The “from them” is perhaps the most notable featun? of the work: Johannes isn’t content merely to acknowledge the sources of his information, he conveys a deep mspect for the fisher111~11in every sentence. He describes their gear and methods in two chap-