Super-Fishermen Of Niue

The following description of Niuean fishermen was written by Judge A.

McCarthy, of the Native Land Court of the Cook Islands, when he sent models of Niue Island canoes to the Southland Centennial Museum, in New Zealand, early in 1942; AS all fishing in Niue is done on the open sea, Unprotected by any outer reef, the island canoes are well and strongly made.

The single canoes are from 15 ft. to 20 ft. long with a beam of not more than 20 in., while the three-men canoes range from 24 ft. to 30 ft. in length and have an inch to three inches more beam. The single canoe is light enough to be picked up by one man with ease and three men can carry the three-men canoes, which are hollowed out to a thickness varying from one-quarter to three-eighths of an inch. They are mere shells.

In these low, narrow catamarans the natives go great distances out to sea at times, but the main fishing grounds lie within a mile of the shore. The ocean bed goes down to great depths and it is nothing for a native to have out 100 to 300 fathoms of line with a fish anywhere from 100 lb. to 400 lb. on his hook The record is said to be a 900 lb. fish, but it was one weighing 558 lb. which gave the greatest thrill. The native hooked it at 6.30 a.m. and it was landed about 5 p.m., after an all-day struggle in which six lines were commissioned for the fight. The original fisherman stuck to his work till 2 p.m., and then, ex hausted, he gave over the lines to other hands. tw o ciL i? reys ,9 f the world catch their swordfish, marlin and tuna on the best of gear and from the finest of launches and the world hears of it as an e 7 T 9 nt ln prose and Picture.

The humble Niuean catches his game

fish—swordfish, shark, vahakula, paala, and many others just as big—and plays them on ah ordinary fishing line with a piece of steel trace about 6 ft. long (a strand of wire hawser) from his modest little canoe.

He is not acclaimed as a superman. He is a food hunter, not a pleasure-hunter.

Sharks tackle the canoes at times and are clubbed off. Think of that, a mile at sea and one-quarter of an inch of wood between you and a monster shark. Just think of that and take your hat off to the Polynesian in his catamaran.

M. Henri Sautot, Governor of New Caledonia, was reported to be in Auck land, en route to London, by the “New Zealand Herald’’ of June 23. He was accompanied by Lieutenant de Vaisseau Fourlinnie, and Paymaster Sub-Lieuten ant Albert Renard. ADC. It is noted that M. Sautot joined the French Colo nial Service in 1908. He was in West Africa for 20 years, and was Governor at St. Pierre (off Newfoundland) before coming to the Pacific to serve succes sively in Tahiti, New Hebrides and New Caledonia.

Mr. W. J. Blaikie, Senior Chemist in the Research Division of the Fiji Agri culture Department, was in New Zealand last month on short furlough.