But there should be some signs if there were any red tides
back then. There should be some signs of that in the
shells. Wood never lasts that long. It almost always rots
out unless it is trapped in the mud someplace and is really
sealed in.
What do you think is the biggest change that you have seen
taken place in your fishing grounds in your lifetime?
RC: Gosh, I do not know. The nets are the biggest change, I
guess. They used to use cotton nets when I started, and now
they use these glass nets. We used to have to mend nets all
the time, but now they do not mend them anymore.
E: Do you catch more fish with a glass net?
RC: Yes.
E: Do you think the mullet learn to see a glass net?
RC: Yes.
E: Other fish do not seem to see the net as well as the mullet.
When you first switched to glass nets, do you think that you
really pulled one over on the mullet, at least for a while?
RC: Yes.
E: He got a lot smarter. People say fish do not get smarter,
only people do. I think when you start cutting down on
their numbers it is the smart ones that are getting away.
You have to remember that.
RC: It is funny how we used to go out here in these skiffs. We
did not have any ice at all in the boat. We would go out
before sundown--the sun would still be up--and we would not
come in the next morning until the sun was up. Those damn
fish were in that skiff all night long, with hot water in
there, and we had no trouble at all selling those fish--all
of them. Now you would never think of buying fish like
that. You would say they were rotten.
E: One of the journals said that on the Cuban rancheros they
used to press the fish after they split them and dried them.
They pressed them with some kind of weights, and it was as
much to kill the maggots as anything else. So it was just
what you were used to. I guess you can get used to a little
maggot here and there. I wonder what those fish looked like
by the time they got them back to Cuba in those hot old
holes.
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