Laide Fishing Station
Introduction
For more than 200 years fishing has been carried out at Gruinard Bay. The fishing rights were held by the estates, mainly by Meyrick Bankes of Letter Ewe and Sir Kenneth MacKenzie of Gairloch.
From the mid nineteenth century when bag nets were introduced the fishings were rented from the estates by merchants - the most notable of these being William Hogarth of Aberdeen and A Powrie of Perth. These merchants provided the fishing equipment, nets, ropes, anchors etc & employed the salmon fishermen.
There were four to five men in a boat and the work was seasonal starting in May/June when the nets were set out in the sea, and finishing in August September when they were lifted. The cobles were also taken out of the water for the winter, a difficult operation involving dragging the boat up a rocky shore on rollers at some of the fishing stations. At other stations there were winches for this task.
Before the bag net was introduced seine nets were used to catch the salmon and this was done by the estate. The catches were shared with the crofters and provided a valuable source of food. Fish were also trapped by the local people who built a low wall across a bay or at the head of a sea loch. At high tide the fish would swim over the "carraidh", become trapped when the tide receded and were easily caught.
Bag Nets
The introduction of the bag net in the mid nineteenth century changed salmon fishing radically. They were much more efficient than the seine nets and as a result of improved transport the large catches, packed in ice, could be sent by sea to Aberdeen and thence to London to be sold as fresh fish. Until this time the fish were boiled and packed in vinegar in vats to preserve them.
A net comprises a bag which salmon enter through a small opening that they have been guided to by a 'leader' net that juts out at right angles from the shore. Salmon will usually follow the coastline as they seek their own river and on encountering a 'leader' will try to swim round it thus being guided to the opening that leads them into the bag.
The number of men employed after the introduction of bag nets increased significantly and salmon fishing became one of the main sources of employment in the area. Much work was involved in the maintaining of the nets which were often damaged by rocks and sharks.
The wire ropes had to be prepared at the start of the season by binding them with twine followed by dipping them in huge vats of tar. The cables had to be repaired and painted, and later, when engines replaced sail and oars, the engines had to be serviced.
Bag nets were fixed to posts on the shore at three points. For each rope a metal post was driven into a hole drilled in the rock and firmly fixed either with lead or slivers of wood hammered into the hole round the post. When these became swollen by water they held the post firmly. The outer end of the net was held by a large anchor on the sea bed.
The nets were lifted and emptied every day except Sunday when there was no fishing. Most stations set up ten nets although latterly, as the number of fish declined, fewer nets were set. As damage to the nets was frequent each station had extra sets of nets which were kept in a net store and carried to a coble on a net barrow.
Laide Fishing Station Ice House
Near the Laide fishing station is the ice house which served as a store for ice with which to pack the salmon that were caught each day. The inside of the ice house is lined with larch planks. Between the lining and the stone walls bracken was packed to improve insulation.
In the winter ice was sourced from Loch na Beiste just over two kilometres away along the Mellon Udrigle road. It was cut from the loch and brought along the road by horse and cart. A chute was built to move the ice from the cart to the opening high in the gable end of the ice house.
To the right of the Laide ice house a concrete base held a winch and boxes of salmon packed with ice were loaded from there onto puffers anchored off shore.
Ther was one other important use for the ice house. It was a custom that if the crew of the fishing station landed over 100 salmon in one day the crew were given a bottle of whisky to share. This would be consumed at the ice house!
Impact on the Crofting Way of Life
The introduction of the bag net and the more efficient method of catching fish was not universally welcomed and had a major impact on the crofting way of life. Dr John Mackenzie has an account in his nephews '100 Years in the Highlands' how as a boy around 1820 he witnessed the sweeping of Loch Kerry with a seine net and how most of the salmon were given to his fathers tennants.
Crofters were self sufficient for all the necessities of life and helped themselves freely, as was their right, to the food available to them on land and sea. Salmon and other fish were a part of their staple diet and at that time salmon were just looked on as a common food. In 1860 Dr John Mackenzie complains that -
"now instead of happy exciting times there are horrid bag nets all round the coast which keep up a melancholy stream of fish, all going to greedy London in exchange for horrid, filthy, useful lucre. My father, luckily for him, died ere the Gairloch salmon came to such de-generation"
Now salmon became a luxury for those who could afford it instead of a common food for the poor. This change was brought about by changes in transport and the use of ice to keep the fish fresh. Before the days of the carriage that could quickly transport goods salmon were salted; salted fish fetched a much lower price than fresh fish.
But fast transport and packing salmon in ice allowed the salmon to reach the London market as fresh fish and this encouraged businessmen to move into the Scottish North-west Highlands to exploit the commercial opportunities. Hence the bag net was introduced to make the operation more efficient and profitable.
This resulted in resentment amongst the people who now lost the right to supply their own needs, "God put salmon in the sea, why should men not have the right to take it out." I have great sympathies with this point of view, but now the law and commercial interests will seek to punish anyone who seeks to help themselves to natures bounty.
Decline in Fish Catches
Many causes have been blamed for the virtual disappearance of wild Atlantic salmon around the shore of the Scottish West Highlands but it should be noted that the decline started in the nineteenth century with the introduction of the bag net. The salmon fishing stations are now all closed, Laide Fishing Station ceasing operation in 1992 and has now been converted into a private residence.
At many of the salmon fishing stations cobles now lie rotting, along with nets, poles, wires, winches, bothies, ice houses and jetties. These can be seen all around the coast, a reminder of a way of life which, in its heydey was a source of employment and income for many crofters in the North-west of Scotland.
Acknowledgement
I would like to thank the Gairloch Heritage Museum for making available to me their archives of information from which the above account was drawn.
Last Days at Laide Fishing Station
An illustrated history of the final years of Laide Fishing Station can be read by clicking here.
Last Updated: June 09, 2009