South Cal Sword Photos - Harpoon Boat

[Mike]

There photos are courtest of Captain Fred Archer. He'll chime in and tell you a bit about them shortly...

[FinalPoint]

Awesome pictures! What's it like being the stick man? Is there a lot of pressure on you and is it a tough job, or relatively easy?...or like lots of things in fishing, does it just kind of depend?

[Captain Fred Archer]

PointMan and Mike,

The photos are courtesy of the fellow in the orange oilskins, longtime pal Sean Burke, who has been working swordfish boats since his teens and who also happens to be one fine, all-around big game fisherman. He started out driving another friend, Gary Zell's boat, Avispa. In those days, Sean "ran" the fish with the boat - no mean feat, that, and Gary, who owned the boat did the sticking.

Is harpooning Elvis exciting? Does a wooden hobby horse have a wooden pee-pee? It is an ancient art and anyone aboard when a sword is spotted and stalked is stunned by the effects of Purple Fever. Every job is exciting, except maybe the hand-pulling of dead swords. Of course, that guy you see crouched at the end of the pulpit with the harpoon in his hands has the most exciting and addictive job of them all. If hunting swords and harpooning them were like a long date with the most incredible woman you have ever met, the harpooner lets everyone else share in the dinner, the show, and the drinks later, but just before the wildest, best sex you could ever dream of happens, he takes her behind a clear glass door and you wind up watching what happens, but you can't touch!

The guys who run the fish with the boat get taken away by their dance moves with a free-swimming sword that is likely to turn or sink out at any second. These guys get to see the fish the longest and best, usually from a very high tower and they study them as they attempt to line them up so they swim under the front of the long plank with the matador waiting for his the chance to strike.

Whatever part you play in this game, including merely observing, it is the single most exciting form of both hunting and fishing that I have ever experienced, bar none!

I wrote an article about fishing with Gary and Sean for The Big Game Journal many years ago entitled "Purple Fever". If I can find it, I will post it. Gary has since retired, but he keeps coming out of retirement to handle the iron again - he simply can't shake the Purple Fever and Sean is fishing on another top boat.

Yes, it takes great skill to harpoon swordfish the right way, by "buttoning" them. The ideal strike is straight down, thru the middle of the back and center of the fish with the lily iron. After the iron pulls out the dart has turned and is in position on the bottom of the fish, the line is coming out the center of the sword's back and then hundreds of feet of rope and buoys are ripped off the boat by the fish. Even mortally wounded like this, the average "soak time" required for the fish to die can be a couple, to several hours on a big one! You have to see that one to believe it. (The boats leave and look for others during the soaks. Tall buoys mark the fish when they have died.) What unbelievable fish they are!

Purple Fever is a hopeless, incurable disease. Those who have it take it to the grave with them. I know, because I have it too.

To their credit, our swordfish guys are very respectful of the resource and never take small ones. They want to only kill fish that have spawned at least once. You are looking at the results. Longliners and drift gillnetters are busily killing every baby swordfish that they catch day and night, around the world, including those that have never spawned. They will kill them all if you let them.

For what it's worth, Mustad is one of, if not the biggest longline supplier in the world.

[quack quack]

Great pics Capt.They bring back a lot of fine memory's

[Tuna Devil]

Very cool Capt., thank you for sharing. It is bitter sweet looking at that. It has been a long time since it looked like that around here but, like QQ said the memory juices sure got flowing.

[greg1]

I want to do that bad!!!!

How much will I owe the captain if I miss the fish? $3/lb ?

What's a "pooned" sword get at the fish house these days?

[Captain Fred Archer]

Tuna Devil...I wish I could post pictures on this danged thing. If I could I'd show you two twins to that wonderful black being sitting there. Labs are gifts from God and are far, far better than people. That looks like a real beauty there!

Greg,

Fresh, harpooned swordfish commands vastly higher prices than the frozen crap being taken by the longliners who are exterminating them. Right now the retails I see are about $15 a pound and the fishermen are probably getting at least 7-8, more on direct-to-market sales. Sean's boat fishes for a major seafood restaurant out here that owns the boat. They sell the fish as meals and wholesale.

I guess this is one of the few places left in the world where there are enough swords to support plankboats...but the fish are pelagic and the longliners are absolutely decimating them. Frozen stuff from Singapore and Taiwan is going for about five bucks at retail and it is clear from the size of the steaks that they are taking very small ones that haven't even spawned yet.

We sure have some big uns out here, don't we? I heard that one of the guys stuck one that market dressed at 801#, which had to put her in the grander class!

[Tuna Devil]

Thank you Capt.

That's Huckleberry Finn (a/k/a Finn). He is our child, and you are right far better than most humans. Couple of good humans around here though.

I live on the East end of L.I., and our stick fishery is gone. I did have the privlage as a boy to take a ride with some of the pros out of Shinnecock in the 70s. Just like you were saying, just being there was a rush. One of the days off of Nantucket we laid two and just waited for one to cruise by. We ended up with two for the day and saw two others! It is hard to believe you could sit in the fog (granted we must have been on the meat, thanks to the Capt.) and wait for one to swim by. 801 # dressed would be a grander all day.

Thanks again for the pictures.

[Captain Fred Archer]

Devil,

Thanks again for a look at Finn and give him a pat on the head for me!

Mine are, Black Bart...sent to me by none other than Capt Black Bart Miller days after I lost my best friend and great love, the great and original Shadow Girl. I swore that no other dog could take her place and that I could and would never own another one. I even cussed Bart out when he insisted get one, and so he found a big, English Black Lab pup, set up an elaborate scheme to fool me into thinking he was sending me a box of lures "to help cheer you up", which I thought was kind of strange and insensitive. When I went to the freight terminal to get "the lures...you have to go get them or you know they'll get stolen", they rolled out this kennel that had an envelope pinned to it that had a big paw print on it and said, "Daddy". When I opened it up it said, "From Shadow Girl, with love." I opened the kennel and out bounded the one who I named "Black Bart of Cabo San Lucas".

Never let it be said that the crustly, sometimes grouchy, rough and tough old man named Captain Bart Miller is anything but one of the finest people you could ever call "friend"!

And Little Shadow Girl...sent to me under unbelievable circumstances by my Shadow Girl herself three days after Bart arrived. I named that dainty, saucy, loving little English bitch after the one who sent her to me, my original Shadow Girl, who helped me write Grim Ripper, then broke my heart and left me to go sit at God's knee.

Labs Rule! They are NOT dogs!