Lopp and Kittredge Scrapbook


fishing spear

Ellen and Tom Lopp, after settling in Seattle, 1902
with Lucy, Dwight, and Katharine
and Weyana, Irene, and Sarah
(Mary and Alice were born after the Lopps left Wales.)

Ellen and Tom Lopp, 1918
with Sarah, Alice, Katharine, Mary, Dwight, Irene, and Weyana
(Lucy died in 1909.)


Native student drawing, c. 1900 © 2001Kathleen Lopp Smith


Equipment:

Once when Woodlet got only a few fish, some superstitious person said it was because she carried a gunny sack instead of a seal skin bag to bring home the fish, usually tomcod or flounder.

When fishers go to a new place they drill a hole through ice three to five feet thick. They have an ice drill, a sharpened piece of iron on a long pole. This breaks the ice up fine and they scoop it out with an ice scoop and break more. They build a wall of blocks of snow on three sides of this to protect themselves from the wind.

The fish pole is about two feet long. The hooks are four sharp points in an ivory body. The sinker is a decoy of stone or ivory with beads for eyes and they use no bait.

They keep the line bobbing up and down in the hole until a fish is caught by his fin or tail or some other part of his body. They draw it up by winding the line on the pole and another stick until the fish comes to the top. Then they knock it off and it freezes to death as it lies in a pile

From Ice Window, p. 105

Fishing line with lures and hooks, simple line and lure, ice drill, ice scoop, and barbed spreading-tined spear.





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