Chiasson’s Journal 04

Chiasson’s Journal 04

An aspiring waterman’s journal. This blog journal will encompass my outdoor ocean experiences for the month of June 2020. I’m a commercial fisherman, spear fisherman, and surfer. These are my stories. Enjoy.

Rough Seas , and cold temperatures on this June early morning.

June 1st – June 2nd – Hauling.

I woke up at 4am rolled out of bed excited for the first day of the season. At the docks at 4:55am I was greeted by Captain Savage, and an old familiar face, Papo. Papo is loud, six foot tall, US veteran originally from the Dominican Republic. I met him last summer for the last few weeks before school started. Savage invited him and his brother Louis to lend a hand with our bait operation to fill my void.

An interesting choice of a new crewman for the hard work, and long hours gill netting can take on for the 66 year old Papo. But his enthusiasm in infectious , and his humble (sometimes unbelievable) stories definitely makes it all the more interesting.

Because of the age and skill difference, I basically became the boat’s lifter. Everything that requires lifting around the boat has to be done by me, because of the condition of Papo’s and Savage’s backs. I am not adjusting well.

The workload change makes me reminisce of last season when my crew mate was the very capable, experienced, and strong Marshal Murray.

Marshal Murray July 2019.

Besides that it was super nice and cool to be out hauling again, I was picking fast and flaking the net with ease. Today was my best first day I have had ever (performance wise), comes with experience I suppose.

We started the day by setting one more string for a total of four strings of nets out now. After that we hauled the three strings, an endured rough seas and winds. The nets we hauled were sitting for twenty four hours. The crew averaged around an hour thirty minutes to each string (rookie numbers) and there wasn’t an overwhelming amount of animals in our nets.

This is due to the cold temperatures of the previous night. The mass population of lobsters in the gulf of Maine tend to crawl inshore during the summertime. We hope (like every other year) to intercept this crawl.

The fourth string we set. 2020.
The goal posts which the net flies and spread itself over putting it back into the ocean. Notice the glistening sunrise. 2020.

June 2nd:

Today went a lot smoother. The seas were calm, the sun was out, ideal conditions for hauling. Still no crawl yet, we landed about the same amount of lobsters (under our 100 a day limit) even after hauling all four strings on a one night set.

There was though a slight increase in ground fish activity. (More information on the landings in the reading below !) We also finished up an hour earlier than the 1st. Making my summer total 22hours as of June 2nd.

June 2nd sunrise. 2020.

Landings:

June 1st ~

  • 65 lobsters (mostly 3-4lbs.)
  • 8 Dab flounders
  • 7 yellowtail flounders
  • 6 grey soul flounders
  • 15 monkfish
  • 4 whiting (bait fish)
  • 1 Black back flounder
  • Rare: Fawn Cusk Eel (throwback)

June 2nd ~

  • 61 lobsters
  • 25 Dab flounders
  • 4 yellowtail flounders
  • 1 black back flounder
  • 7 grey soul flounders
  • 3 whiting (bait fish)
  • 1 mud hake (bait fish)
  • 6 monkfish
  • 1 cod
  • Cool/Rare: Long horn Sculpin.

*Note it is hard for me to take images of the rare landings because time is money in the fishing industry. Also images may be considered graphic, view at your own discretion.

June 1st Lobster Haul and a bunch of monkfish heads which we give to our state trooper pal, who lobsters in his spare time !
Slammer cod under so mixed species of flounder. Note monk tails at the top, (poor mans lobster). In the center you can see the eye of a whiting.
June 2nd up close of the merchandise.

Hope y’all found this to be an interesting read, check back later this week for issue 05. Thanks !

Links of concern: https://blacklivesmatter.com/defundthepolice/

Enough said.

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