The early lobster fishery of Berneray, Harris
Liam Alasdair Crouse discusses what the recordings on the Tobar an Dualchais website tell us about how the environment can shape cultural practice…..
Like many coastal areas in the Highlands and Islands of Scotland before the Second World War, the lobster fishery was the principal marine species exploited commercially in Berneray, Harris.
There were several reasons for this. Firstly, the lobster ships well. It can survive out of water and without food for long periods, sometimes up to a fortnight if conditions are good.
They were sent, initially under sail around the Pentland Firth, and latterly by steamer and rail to the large southern markets. Lobsters could survive the journey as long as the weather didn’t get too warm.
The method of fishing did not require as much investment as other types of fishing.
The gear – the creel, rope, and buoy – was relatively simply and could be made cheaply by hand at home. Inshore boats, commonly constructed in the islands, were used.
They differed from the large Zulu and Fifie boats of the herring industry.
Lobster fishing was usually prosecuted in tandem with crofting and other onshore pursuits, as the fishing was usually done in the morning.
Local environmental knowledge was vital to navigating a seascape strewn with skerries and reefs and frequented by strong tidal currents.
Without access to such expertise, gathered and developed within tight-knit community groups, a fishing journey could just as easily end in disaster.
The final, and perhaps most important influence was the natural environment.
Berneray’s position within the Sound of Harris meant that it was further away from other lucrative fishing grounds such as the Minch herring or the Atlantic cod and ling.
The waters surrounding Berneray are prime lobster real estate; it was only natural that the island’s fishermen would go after them.
These reasons all combined to make the lobster fishery the mainstay of the island’s sea-based economy.
As the well-known Berneray anthem, Eilean Uaine Bheàrnaraigh, sung in track 34790 by the bard’s son, Donnchadh MacFhionghain, remarks:
Tha giomach pailt san àite seo,
Ga shlaodadh às na càrnaichean,
Le clèibh is buill is àrcannan.
Cha tàr a-mach a bheò às.
[The lobster is abundant in this place,
Drawing from their crevices,
With creels and ropes and buoys.
He won’t escape with his life.]
The establishment of the lobster fishing industry in the Highlands and Islands was as much as result of the destitution of the Highland Clearances and potato famine as it was economic opportunity.
The removal of tenants to allow the formation of larger farms, such as Borgh/Borve in 1854, increased the number of cottars in places such as Cùl na Beinne/Backhill and Ruisigearraidh/Rushgarry.
Malcolm MacLeod, a cottar evicted from Borgh, detailed in his testimony to the Napier Commission in 1883 how the cottars had to “seek for their maintenance on the sea, many of them at lobster fishing.”
With time, an industry was established, once driven by need and now drawn by burgeoning demand.
Britian was amid the Industrial Revolution and its expanding urban population required cheap and abundant protein.
Transport infrastructure was built to connect the remote corners of the island nation in order to bring vast quantities of food – livestock and seafood – to the markets of London.
What did this industry look like in Berneray?
The Tobar an Dualchais website is full of examples of oral history, gathered by fieldworker Ian Paterson (see my July 2023 article) in the 1970s and 1980s from an ageing group of fishermen, many who had themselves entered the industry in its heyday during the 1920s and 1930s.
As I will discuss in a future article, these decades were a pivotal period in the development of the industry due to motorisation.
The fishing gear was homemade. Rope was twisted heather (sioman fraoich) (Track 60057). Before the introduction of the creel, a device called the “rings” was used (sgùil).
It consisted of a net spread across iron rings with bait in the middle (Track 56206). The device was drawn tight to entrap the feasting lobster.
The method was limiting, as it required the continual attention of the fishermen.
The introduction of the creel (cliabh), or lobster pot, to Britian in the 19th century revolutionised the industry. It allowed fishermen to fish multiple traps overnight.
The increase of catches, coupled with the quicker methods of bringing lobsters to market, gave rise to government concerns of overfishing, with greater regulation to follow.
The creel would still be built by hand, although materials such as the withes (caoil) and netting (lìon) were imported from the mainland (Track 56206).
As a valued handcraft that was vital to the island economy, the creel became the subject of praise. A personal favourite of mine is a verse composed by the Berneray bard, Eachann MacFhionghain (1886-1954), sometime in the 1920s.
The story, related in tracks 73193 and 51118, tell how Eachann visited Seonaidh Aonghais Dhòmhnaill as he was constructing a lobster creel.
Seonaidh thought that the creel deserved a verse from the bard and started to describe to Eachann the different pieces of the creel and where they were sourced. Eachann then said, “well, I suppose you could say:
Gur ann agam fhèin a tha an cliabh as ciataich’ thèid air sàl,
Air a chòmhdach leis an lìon air fhighe sìos le snàth.
Trì boghannan dhen chaol cho caoin ’s a lùb nam làmh
A dh’fhàs am Muile nam beann fuar; bheir e giomach ruadh à càrn.
[It is my own, the prettiest creel that will go to sea,
Wrapped in netting and stitched down with twine.
Three bows of the most tender withes to bend in my hand,
Which grew in Mull of the cold bens; it will bring a brown lobster from his burrow.]
It was the crew’s responsibility to furnish their own creels for the boat. There were around four crew to a boat, each with a dozen or so creels and catching between three- to five-dozen lobsters a day.
There were, and are, abundant lobster fishing grounds around Berneray, from the eastern “peat islands” such as Obasaigh and Neartaigh, to the Pabbay Sound, along the shores of North Uist, and out to Haisgeir.
Fishing inshore would be a daily task, with the fishermen taking the opportunity to net cuddies (cudaigean) and saithe (saoidhean) as well – both for creel bait and for the kitchen pot (Track 56206).
The journey to Haisgeir would last six days, with the crew sleeping on board the 23-foot decked boat powered by oar and sail.
It would naturally follow that the fishermen of the Sound of Harris possessed an intimate knowledge of the marine environment, including the unseen seabed in the days before sonar.
Territory would be marked out through naming with the likes of Bodha Ruairidh Alasdair, Bodha Nèill, and Bodha Sheonaidh Choinnich connoting informal fishing rights.
Fishing marks (comharran-iasgaich) used triangulation with visible onshore features to act as mnemonic devices. Lining up Mìle-sgeir and Cnoc nan Claigeann marked two reefs, Am Bodha Beag and Am Bodha Mòr, and Bodha Raonuill Ruaidh was found by concealing MacLean of Boreray’s house behind Mìle-sgeir.
This traditional ecological knowledge was essential to the successful exploitation of the lobster fisheries in Berneray, following a period of immense hardship.
It also traces the detailed understanding developed by a maritime population to make use of available resources.
Such case studies contribute to our own insight regarding the influence of ecology on culture and economy, and the ways in which those influences are embodied within a population’s folklore.
We can think about how certain fisheries require different equipment, different boat designs, and a differing knowledge and expertise to exploit certain species.
The variegated economic histories of these islands provide useful comparative examples of cultural ecology, shaped through access to resources and viability of activities.
They reveal a society adapting its cultural practices to their environmental contexts, contributing to economic survival, cultural identity, and environmental stewardship.