quote:Researchers think that fish weirs were controlled by the clans or villages that constructed them. Records indicate that the Cherokee would even lease the use of the weirs to early settlers. After land was taken from the Cherokee, government appraisers assigned dollar values to the fish weirs when calculating compensation due to the Cherokee.
See there, I told y’all they had their own form of oyster barons:smiley:
Capt. Larry Teuton
Cracker Built Custom Boats
“Ships are the nearest things to dreams that hands have ever made.” -Robert N. Rose
quote:Native Americans are the only people on this continent who aren't aliens
Aint that the truth! If anyone in this country has a right to b@tch, it’s the American Indians. Dang we treated those people bad. Have any of you ever been to Cherokee NC and seen the live production they do in the amphitheater called Unto these Hills? It’s a story about the Trail of Tears, and it’s a sad story
Capt. Larry Teuton
Cracker Built Custom Boats
“Ships are the nearest things to dreams that hands have ever made.” -Robert N. Rose
i do not know if it would tell you who built the trap, but you could more than likely get a time frame of when the spear was built. the fish traps were used for a long time by different “tribes” i am sure.
quote:Originally posted by SSFiero
Thanks for the insight.
I think if I found that spear I would have kept it.
Now I’d take pics and leave it.
I wonder if that spear could determine what tribes built the trap?
Mako 1901 Inshore-Honda 130
10% of the people catch 90% of the fish.
quote:I think if I found that spear I would have kept it.
Now I'd take pics and leave it.
Good man, thank you. Not only is it bad karma, but it’s also against the law in this particular area. Daws Island is a State Heritage Preserve and it’s illegal to take artifacts.
Very cool.
“They knew how to catch fish” —It wasn’t recreational, it was survival
When the Cherokee man met with the Irish women (or vice versa), the redneck was born
I would bet that mostly the women and children fished in this manner. Also think about how they had to be “in tune” to the tides so that these traps would work. I wonder if they would use these traps to collect a large number of fish at a time and either smoke them or have another way to store the meat or would visit them more often and take just enough to feed the tribe for a day or two. It’s amazing to think about how we have to manage resources in today’s terms but the Native Americans had to really manage their resources.
I know of one up around the Bulls Bay area, but I thought it was natural. I don’t have the guts to try to get out of the boat and check it out because of the location, but if I ever get up there in a kayak, I’ll be all over it.
Semper Fi
18’ Sterling
115 Yamaha
Big Ugly Homemade Blue Push Pole
quote:
I'm just interested in it from a historical perspective.
Me too. I find it fascinating. Daws Island is amazing, and there are several colleges doing archeological digs there now. They have dated some of the middens at over 12,000 years old!
I took a buddy into one the traps a couple of months ago and he needed to go ashore to answer a nature call. We pulled up to a shell midden and when he stepped out the boat there was a spear head about 9" long laying right there in the shells. I wish I had photographed it, it was beautiful. Fish spear I presume. I asked him to push it back into the mud and leave it. I take nothing but my trash, leave nothing but my footprints, ain’t messing with no Indian spirits.
Capt. Larry Teuton
Cracker Built Custom Boats
“Ships are the nearest things to dreams that hands have ever made.” -Robert N. Rose
Larry…my admiration for you just went up even more. That’s awesome. I think you and my daddy would get along great. A lot alike…different…but alike.
quote:I think you and my daddy would get along great. A lot alike..different..but alike.
I’m sure we would, we are probably not much different at all. I grew up just like you did, my Daddy was a fisherman, shrimper, crabber, oysterman and clam digger too. Whatever it took. I did the same things for a lot of my life, everything from digging clams to charter boat captain. Those marshes have provided for my family for over 60 years, one way or another. A picture of me at 35 would look just like your daddy at 35, and a picture of me now would look very similar except he has a much nicer beard:smiley:
Most of our coastal islands have Native American ruins and I was raised to consider them sacred ground. I’ve roamed them all my life, spent numerous nights camping on them, hunting and fishing them. We’ve found thousands of artifacts and I’ve kept exactly one. My Dad never even kept one and never let me when I was a kid. He told me they belong to the land, not to us, and they need to stay on the land.
He’s gone now, but I think it’s the right thing to do. At least for me. It belongs in the shells, not on my book shelf.
Capt. Larry Teuton
Cracker Built Custom Boats
“Ships are the nearest things to dreams that hands have ever made.” -Robert N. Rose
