Roberto
Guest
Yesterday I was enjoying watching the pelicanos gathering and diving off the beach. Down the beach came a panga which stopped and spred their net. They were close in so I got a good view of the procedure. I think the pelicanos attracted the fishermen, but as usual there was a spotter on the prow.
First the spotter threw a maybe 5 gallon plastic container into the sea. Attached was the top rope of a net which also had smaller round floats attached at regular intervals. The net was one of the fine single filiment green nets you see around. A second rope was attached parallel to the top rope and may have had some wieghts on it, could not see. The man at the engine quickly accelerated and made a wide loop circling back to the large float, while the spotter fed the net into the water quickly as the boat looped. In this manner the entire net was in the sea and unattached to the panga. The panga stayed inside the area surrounded by the net after all the net was fed into the sea. Oddly, I thought at the time, the panga acelerated after releasing the net completely and sped around the circumference of the enclosed area for several minutes.
Next they stopped and brought the large float onto the panga. One man pulled the top rope and the other found and pulled the bottom rope with the net in between gathering the top rope into the boat toward the front of the panga and the bottom rope toward the rear of the panga and the net loosely piled inbetween on the bottom of the panga. The net was retrieved in a linear fashion with no attempt to make a closed net to scoop up the fish. At fairly short intervals each man would stop pulling to remove a fish that was snared in the fine netting. The fish were silvery in color and appeared to be corvina each at least 12 inches in length. The openings in the netting was were large enough that smaller fish were not caught. There was virtually no by-catch with the exception of one small ray and a dead bird. I estimate they brought in 40 or 50 corvina in 30 ro 40 minutes of activity.
I puzzled over why the panga raced around inside the net enclosed area till I came to the notion that they were scaring the fish so they would try to flee the noise and then get caught in the net.
The 'tell' of the pelican's feeding and diving is a good one for shore fishing. In this instance I think one could have been maybe waist deep and cast into the area the pelicans were feeding. Might have caught some fish !!
First the spotter threw a maybe 5 gallon plastic container into the sea. Attached was the top rope of a net which also had smaller round floats attached at regular intervals. The net was one of the fine single filiment green nets you see around. A second rope was attached parallel to the top rope and may have had some wieghts on it, could not see. The man at the engine quickly accelerated and made a wide loop circling back to the large float, while the spotter fed the net into the water quickly as the boat looped. In this manner the entire net was in the sea and unattached to the panga. The panga stayed inside the area surrounded by the net after all the net was fed into the sea. Oddly, I thought at the time, the panga acelerated after releasing the net completely and sped around the circumference of the enclosed area for several minutes.
Next they stopped and brought the large float onto the panga. One man pulled the top rope and the other found and pulled the bottom rope with the net in between gathering the top rope into the boat toward the front of the panga and the bottom rope toward the rear of the panga and the net loosely piled inbetween on the bottom of the panga. The net was retrieved in a linear fashion with no attempt to make a closed net to scoop up the fish. At fairly short intervals each man would stop pulling to remove a fish that was snared in the fine netting. The fish were silvery in color and appeared to be corvina each at least 12 inches in length. The openings in the netting was were large enough that smaller fish were not caught. There was virtually no by-catch with the exception of one small ray and a dead bird. I estimate they brought in 40 or 50 corvina in 30 ro 40 minutes of activity.
I puzzled over why the panga raced around inside the net enclosed area till I came to the notion that they were scaring the fish so they would try to flee the noise and then get caught in the net.
The 'tell' of the pelican's feeding and diving is a good one for shore fishing. In this instance I think one could have been maybe waist deep and cast into the area the pelicans were feeding. Might have caught some fish !!
