Bunches of rye grass were tied to the floor of the loose cradle of line to create the illusion of a floor or river-bed. This kept the fish in the river’s upper level heading for the denser-woven net near the shore through which they could not escape. Guile and knowledge of the quarry were essential in the capture of this turbo-charged fish. A salmon can outswim any creature in the river, and indeed most in the ocean.
In some ways it is peculiar that the Indians never developed the art of rod-angling. In the Azores today medium-sized fishing boats go to sea to take tuna, armed with bunches of fishing poles which are fished manually by fishermen just as day-boat anglers jig for pollack and mackerel. Rod and line is simply the best way of catching tuna. Additionally, rod-caught fish remain clean and attract the highest prices in the market.
The Indians approximated to this with line-fishing by trolling. Trolling from canoes took place in the bays and inlets before the fish range was narrowed by the confinement of rivers. A witness at the time describes what the Nootka Indians did:
‘For slimness and invisibility the braided leaders were made from women’s hair, or in rougher water from the quills of birds or porcupines. A hook was baited with fresh sprat or herring, and the line was attached to the solo canoeist’s paddle. The whole rig was sunk with small sinker stones. As the oarsman moved his paddle back and forth a slow jerking movement of the hook attracted the salmon. The paddle was then handled in such a way that the salmon was boated.’
You may ask, what were the hooks made from in a culture without metal? It is ingenious. ‘Bentwood’, or wood of hemlock, balsam, fir or spruce branches were used, but taken only from the places there were knots. For knots were denser than ordinary wood and instead of floating, sank. This wood was shaved to the right slimness, then steamed and pressed into a hook-shaped mould. Deer tallow rubbed onto the hook before cooling prevented the hooped construction re-opening. The barbs, lashed on, were fashioned from bone.
The ways in which Pacific-coast salmon were utilised once extracted from their natural element were diverse. Presumably some were used to fuel the energies of hungry fishermen and trappers and eaten fresh. Summer diets consisted of berries and shellfish; salmon was a burst of marine protein. But the bulk of the harvest was preserved for winter by drying and smoking. Nineteenth-century photographs show Indians dip-netting, scoop- and bag-netting and catching salmon in a multifarious manner, with the racks of fish drying in the background. Just as the weirs were often enormous structures involving the use of entire trees, and very long and strongly built, the drying-racks could be structures bigger than houses. Fir boughs protected the fish from direct sun and racks were positioned to catch warm winds for drying. Anything near ground level would attract grizzlies, hence the structures were built aloft.
Weather was all-important. There were good seasons for curing and drying fish, which was ideally done outside. If it had to be done inside, as much of the salmon harvest as could be accommodated was brought in. But for the really large-scale curing, space was needed, and that relied on clement conditions. Complete failure to cure the winter food supply successfully could lead to local starvations. There are a number of peoples, like the Han of the Yukon River, who critically depended on salmon runs for their survival over winter.
The V-shaped drying-racks could handle hundreds of salmon sides. Caches for salmon were built on stilts both to catch the wind and to keep bears off, and they were considerable structures. Some were the size of residential log cabins. There is a photograph of a cache built on several different floors climbing a single tree and connected by ladders. The Indians had wooden tongs for lifting fish. Strainers for removing them from cooking-pots were constructed of seal-ribs. Knives were made of mussel shells, and fish skins were dried on triangular blocks designed to stretch them. The number of varying utensils created to manage the salmon harvest equals the refinement of a modern kitchen equipment range. But all came from at-hand natural products. Tube-like bottles were made from the hollow necks of sea-kelp fronds.
The salmon were not only used for preserved food and skins. On the Fraser River the oil was taken from decomposing salmon bodies which had been left in troughs in the sun to rot, allowing the oil to seep to the bottom. Oil was procured too from the livers of dogfish and cod, and also from the bodies of eulachon (small oily river fish captured in shoals). Salmon roe was hung separately on racks and eaten when decomposed. Alternatively, salmon roe was sunk in boxes below the tide and rotted there before being consumed. Perhaps this is no more strange than raw salmon or gravlax being eaten in Scandinavia today. To many people, gravlax is the best salmon preparation of all.
The importance of the salmon in north-west Pacific culture is reflected in the artistry which was devoted to decoration of the tools deployed in their capture. Salmon was regarded as a sacred food resource with sacramental and life-saving qualities and was accordingly a repeat symbol in the region’s famous art. A nineteenth-century French missionary staying in a Huron fishing village described the eloquence of local preachers whose job it was to persuade salmon to come into the nets and be caught. His sermons were theatrical performances attended by the village in a hushed silence. Salmon, remember, possess souls.
Ceremonies preceded the opening of the fishing season. It was believed that salmon would reappear again only if their spirits had been properly appeased. The Indians regarded salmon spirits as closely linked to the human ones which subsisted upon their bodies. Salmon were seen as possessing a conscious spirit and their returning presence to their natal streams viewed as a voluntary act rather than the gene-driven survival ritual identified by biologists today.
If salmon failed to come back, the Indians believed they had broken sacred taboos, or in some way offended the spirit of the fish. Indeed, instead of perceiving the capture of the salmon as the wily manifestation of the skilled hunter’s art, the captured salmon was seen as complicit in its own capture. A willing participant in the scheme of things, the fish was taken only with its own consent, and its capture was dependent on certain conditions being fulfilled. In this sense the link between the salmon migration and the peoples who relied on them was similar to the relationship between the Saami of northern Scandinavia and Arctic Russia and reindeer.
The first salmon caught triggered more ceremonies. On the Lower Fraser the Tlingit peoples take the first sockeye to the chief who in turn carries it to his wife. She thanks the salmon chief for sending this emissary. The whole tribe attends the ritual consumption of this first salmon following a rigid set of rules, cleansing themselves with a special concoction of plants beforehand.
The life-giving fish had returned and the rhythmic cycles of Nature are again underlined and confirmed. Instead of chewing the dried salmon cured in a previous year, people could again eat fresh salmon with the tang of the sea.
In addition, the returning silver salmon were seen as capable of dispelling diseases and sickness. Prayers reflected the belief that while the salmon were being eaten in the opening ceremonies their souls surveyed the proceedings from above. Is this why, without knowing it, the rod-angling fraternity hang salmon replicas on the fishing hut or the sporting-lodge wall?
Most tribes had a ritual involving the salmon bones being returned to the river or the sea. One tribe burnt the bones instead, although usually incineration was avoided. The purpose of the rituals was a new commitment to the cycle which would propitiate the salmon spirits and ensure their return in following seasons. There were ceremonies as the salmon was cut and prayers were intoned by senior citizens in the tribe. The fish was honoured. Not before this was done were other fishermen allowed to start fishing from the rest of the salmon run. Which of us Western rod anglers hasn’t toasted a first fish? Perhaps more often we have toasted lost fish, the expression on the face of the worsted angler being the most interesting. We observe remnants of old tribal manners without knowing why.
In one ceremony where the salmon is served on cedar planks the fish has to be handled so that the head is always pointing in the direction of the fish-run, or upstream in the river. The Lkungen tribe in Vancouver Island send their children to