Seaworthy (14 page)

Do fish have the capacity to experience feelings of defeat or triumph? The belief that they do makes catching them that much more intense an experience. Who wants to engage in battle with a rock? I have in the past maintained that anthropomorphism is Greek to me. But it's impossible to avoid attributing human characteristics, motivations, and qualities to a swordfish once you've encountered one eye to eye in its last gasp before succumbing, or once you've sensed the bravado in the slap of a tail of one fresh off the hook and diving for freedom. It's an egotistical world that I live in. It's a world that revolves around all I know and believe. Swordfish, among everything else, can be described and understood only in terms of “me.” Once I discovered that swordfish are monogamous, I perceived the partners of those dead on hooks I'd hauled that followed their mates to the surface, allowing me to harpoon them, as suicidal. We call them “twofers” and believe that the survivor of the hook just could not go on without its better half. We, according to our own lore, put the second fish out of its misery. As ridiculous as that sounds, if you haven't been there, you haven't been there.

On the other end of the sword personality spectrum is the fish as a warrior.
Xiphias gladius
is the Braveheart of the ocean. With few existing natural predators, swordfish through the ages have probably wiped out anything that could have been a threat. Their flat, double-edged bill is a built-in weapon. And nothing wields a weapon more quickly or with more dexterity than a swordfish. I have seen their samurai act firsthand. I now remembered that episode with the same amazement I'd felt when seeing the original version.

It was way back in my college days when I worked the deck of the
Walter Leeman
for Alden Leeman during summer breaks. We fished Georges Bank this particular trip, and because of that we were able to long-line and harpoon. You see, Georges is one of the few places in the world where swordfish “fin,” or come to the surface, making them targets for “stick fishing.” It was a blistering-hot day, the type that almost never occurs offshore. We had hauled aboard the last of the longline gear and jogged up onto the bank to look for finners. The water was cooler up on the shoals, creating a low layer of wispy fog that curled and drifted aimlessly over the surface like steam on a hot skillet. Harpooning was my favorite part of any day, and I scrambled up to the crow's nest, where I took my newly won position of helmsman. I had eyes that could literally see fish, plain and simple. I could see them far away. I could see them close by. And I could see them underwater and anticipate where they would break the surface next. I could see fish that others could not, no matter how vigorously I pointed or directed by hour of the clock or compass rose. There was a method to my scan, and it worked. Although five of us looked, I spotted 90 percent of the fish we successfully “ironed” that season.

As soon as I was situated at the top of the mast, Alden switched the engine controls from the wheelhouse to where I could drive, with the aim of putting the boat on any fish I could find so that Alden could throw the dart. There was only one way to put the boat on a fish. That was to lead the fish with the bow of the boat, or to sort of maneuver the boat so that our paths intersected stem to sword in a crossing fashion. Not head-on or by the tail, as either of those approaches would spook the fish before it was close enough to attempt a throw of the harpoon. The fish doesn't get nervous as long as it has an eye on what's coming. That alone speaks volumes about swordfish attitude. A seventy-foot vessel powered by a six-hundred-horse diesel engine, looming high above the surface as well as cutting through well below, does not cause a fish to make a quick exit unless it comes from behind. I was well versed in boat handling, and I learned the strategy quickly under Alden's tutelage. We, as a team, had been quite formidable. Of course, we owed a lot of our prowess to Alden's ability to really pitch the pole, launching a Hail Mary shot and making miraculous contact.

My hands were black with soot from the exhaust that coated the mast and the rungs of the ladder I scaled to achieve the highest post on the boat. From below, Alden shouted an occasional compass heading for me to follow as we poked along hoping for fins. I searched the horizon—all 360 degrees of it—which was relatively close in the hazy conditions. On every other rotation, I looked down, deep into the water all around the boat. The rest of the crew was just coming out of the fish hold, where they had iced what the hooks had produced today. They yelled up that they were going to the galley for lunch and would bring me a sandwich when they came up the mast to help look. It was almost getting to be a joke. I knew they wouldn't see anything. They knew it, too. “Come on, Linda! Find us a fish!” And they disappeared like ants into a hill beneath me. Some days Alden would let the crew nap while we harpooned, waking them only to haul the rigs back aboard and take care of the fish. But this hadn't been the best day hookwise, and Alden wasn't in the most charitable mood. So after lunch it would be all hands in the mast or on the forward deck.

I wanted badly to find a fish before the rest of the crew emerged from the fo'c'sle, which I suppose is some weird fallout from my competitive nature. Or perhaps it's due to selfishness. Being alone in the crow's nest and driving the boat onto a fish to be stuck with a hand-thrown harpoon is the most exciting and exhilarating experience. It's a thrill that is addictive, and there was a desire in me to not water it down with company. It all starts with fins cutting the surface. The dart penetrates fish. The line zips overboard, ripped from clothespins that hold it along the pulpit—
snap, snap, snap
—I can still feel that sound. I looked hard, with the belief that if you search hard enough, you can produce fish. Working in the crow's nest is also my deepest connection to the past. Harpooning is the most primitive and fundamental way to catch a fish. It's a frenzied sensation that I suspect I must share with the whalers of old.

As I was scanning the horizon over the port bow, a splash caught my eye off to the starboard. I concentrated on where the surface was riled up, thinking it could have been a porpoise or a tuna, as swordfish rarely breach. Fins cut the surface and then disappeared. It was too quick for me to identify as a sword. My heart raced as I pushed the throttle up and turned toward where I had seen the fins, hoping for another look. There they were again! They were big and wide-set. It must be a great fish, I thought, as Alden made his way out to the end of the pulpit and untied the harpoon. A second pair of fins popped out, seemingly chasing the first. They were different, and I recognized them as shark fins. Too stiff for blue shark. When they broke the surface again, we were closer. “Mako!” I yelled, and prayed we would beat the shark to the fish, as I knew that the shortfin mako is one of the swordfish's only natural predators. The water roiled as the two sets of fins clashed and then submerged. I slowed the boat and kept looking at the spot where the fish had been.

“Can you still see them?” Alden shouted from the stand.

“Yes. I can see shadows, but they're too deep to hit. It looks like the sword is attacking the shark!” And back to the surface they came, all thrashing and throwing water about. They were close off our starboard side. They separated and stayed on the surface, circling each other like dueling gunfighters preparing to draw. From my vantage point, I could see a cloud of blood in the water. Alden instructed me to put him on the mako first, since he knew that the fish would surely be eaten by the shark once it was disadvantaged by the harpoon. I was full of nervous excitement. I'd seen fish and sharks tangle before, but always when the fish had been in the vulnerable situation of being stuck on a hook and tethered to longline gear. I'd seen on too many occasions the remains of what a mako shark can't eat before we haul it away and aboard the boat. The fish never fares well. But this mako was going after a free swimmer!

As we neared, the mako was swimming directly behind the swordfish, as if it would take a bite out of its tail. My heart raced faster as I estimated the sword to weigh at least three hundred pounds, which would be a day saver. And the mako looked even bigger. We had to kill the shark before it got the fish! Suddenly the swordfish turned 180 degrees—in the length of its body—and slashed at the shark with its massive bill. More blood streamed. Alden turned to his right and launched the harpoon. He ironed the mako dead in the center of its fins—“backboning,” as we say when the spine is severed, killing the fish instantly. The shark sank, pulling the dart line from the boat slowly until the buoy marking the end went over the side.

I put the boat in gear and made a lazy circle around the buoy. I searched the water around the boat for the swordfish. I scanned the horizon. I looked deep. There were no fins. There was no cigar-shaped purple shadow below. I prayed that the fish would give us a shot. Alden had rerigged the harpoon with another dart and line, then waited poised to throw at the end of the narrow stand sticking out from the bow much like the bill from a fish. “Where's the sword?” Alden asked, without looking up.

“I don't see it,” I answered, without looking at him.

“Jesus Christ! Did you take your eyes off the fish? It was a monster!” Alden was pissed. I was disappointed, and I knew from experience not to remind the captain that he had ordered me to go onto the shark first. I kept looking, but the fish was gone. Alden kept crabbing at me about losing the fish. He blamed me. I was used to it. Besides, I realized that if I took some credit for the fish we got, I also had to shoulder some of the responsibility for the ones that got away. The more Alden bitched, the more I started resenting the swordfish for tricking us. We had been lured into a ploy to kill the sword's worst enemy. I felt like a character in one of Aesop's fables, where the animals teach some moral lesson. But I didn't know what the lesson was.

It was a frustrating afternoon, with only one buoy bobbing around to show for our effort. When it came time to think about setting the longline, Alden had one of the guys haul the rig with the mako attached. The shark came aboard all limp, as we expected. It had deep gashes and long cuts from its fight with the sword. We all agreed that this was indeed a first, to see a mako lose a battle with a swordfish. This swordfish, the one that got away, was the warrior of all warriors. The crew was skeptical about the details I supplied. I guess I wouldn't have believed the story either if I hadn't seen it myself. When the butcher cleaned the shark and examined the contents of its stomach, he exclaimed with some amazement about a small fish he found among the half-digested foodstuff in the shark's recent diet. I inspected the fish along with the rest of the crew. It was the tiniest baby sword any of us had ever seen. We surmised the one that got away to have been the baby's mother, and I felt better about her escape and no longer resented her for tricking me into killing the shark.

That was my first memory of actually attributing human emotion and motivation to a fish. It's a foolish exercise. But it helps make sense of things I can't otherwise understand. And I take comfort in knowing that the inclination to twist, justify, and reason the unreasonable is somewhat universal. Thinking about it now as I steamed along, I had to admit that I'd been outsmarted by many fish. I'll never learn the answer to what cerebral abilities and emotional capacities fish have. But believing that they're more than just hunks of meat makes my life considerably more interesting. Respect for the intellect of fish, beyond thinking that they are merely eating and reproducing machines, levels the playing field, in my mind, and eases the pain of unfair accusations of slaughtering innocent fish.

I nearly laughed out loud when I realized the thought process in which I'd just indulged myself. I had proven, beyond the shadow of a doubt, that the cumulative effect of age on one's mind is overwhelming. My crew would've laughed me out of the wheelhouse if they could read my thoughts, including all this drivel about fish psyche. I wondered how Alden
really
felt about fish. Was his relationship to them one-dimensional? Was his mentality one that could only handle killing something he regarded as inanimate? Killer instinct tarnishes with age. It's there, just different from what it was in youth.

I would make better use of my thinking time by concentrating on a harder science than what others would regard as the soft—fish psychology. As far as I was concerned, all science surrounding swordfish is brittle. There are a few undeniable truths about the swordfish that make its capture possible, or at least more likely than not. Unlike me, swordfish are cold-blooded predators. They do have feeding routines and habits. The longline is designed to maximize and take advantage of known fish habits and tendencies. For example, swordfish feed daily, usually at night when they rise to the surface to chase pelagic bait fish. They seem to bite better on the nights surrounding the full moon. Thus our daily loop of set and haul, with maximum soak time to accommodate the nocturnal feeders, syncing our trips with the lunar cycle. Swordfish do not travel in schools. Loners or loose aggregations are the norm. Therefore long-lining and harpooning are the preferred and proven methods of fishing for them. They feed on bait that congregates on the current changes where two bodies of water meet. For example, where the Gulf Stream and the Labrador Current come together is ideal. Swordfish are highly migratory; this pattern dictates the seasonality. There's no sense fishing the Grand Banks in the winter. Their sense of sight is keen. Therefore we make use of visual aids on our gear, like light sticks and spinners and glowing beads that might attract fish. Swordfish have the ability to physically heat their eyes and brain when surfacing from the depths, increasing their vision. They have some sense of smell, making the use of cod liver oil helpful in luring them to hooks. They may even have some degree of hearing. We sometimes use rattles on leaders. Swordfish are powerful swimmers. So the snaps that attach leaders to the main line are designed to slide, and not jam when a fish realizes it's hooked. Great bait and sharp hooks are the most basic keys to success once the gear is in the water. Swords are a spawn fish. Females carry over 1 million eggs, allowing swordfish to remain strong as a species while being harvested one at a time by hooks. Swordfish are quite adept at feeding themselves, and there's not much hope of outsmarting them. So fishermen basically have to drop the hooks on their heads in order to have any degree of success. Be in the right location. Serve something appetizing. Rig proper gear.