Le Nord : revue internationale des Pays de Nord - 01.06.1938, Side 319

THE ICELANDIC FISHERIES
3 °9
4. Modern Icelandic Fisheries.
It is obvious from what has been said above that fishing must
be by far the most important occupation of the Icelandic nation.
In accordance with this we find that fish products exported from
Iceland in the years 1932—36 range from 84.1% to 92.4% of
the value of the total exports for these years. ¥e think it of some
interest therefore, to give an outline of how these values are pro-
cured from the depths of the ocean.
First we go on board an Icelandic steam trawler. These are
modern fishing vessels, mostly of 300 to 400 tons, fishing with
the well-known tackle called the otter trawl. This is perhaps the
most effective fishing gear in the world. In a single hour ten to
twenty tons of fish (Norway haddock) can be taken with such
a trawl. The Icelandic trawlers are provided with all the modern
equipment of fishing vessels, e. g. wireless, echometers, electric
direction-finders, liver rendering factories for medicinal oil, and
in some of them we find small fish-meal factories.
Our trawler is entering the harbour of Reykjavík on a Sep-
tember day. Immediately she finds the berth allotted to her and
the crew are allowed to go ashore for an hour or so. Then work
starts again, the vessel being loaded with frozen fish in the hold
which is equipped as a freezing-room, because the catch is to be
taken abroad by the ship in the fresh state. An hour or two after-
wards our trawler has disappeared from its temporary berth, and
we sight a great column of smoke far out in the Faxa Bay. Here
the skipper intends to make a few hauls in the night in order to
get some more of the valuable plaice. When the next day dawns,
a southerly course is taken, and four or five days later we find our
trawler again in the dock of Hull or Grimsby, Bremerhaven, or
some other great fishing port of England or Germany. When the
catch has been sold, the engines resume their work and the course
is set for the North Sea. The boxes under the deck are now filled
up with coal which has to last for about two or three weeks until
the vessel again enters a port where coal is cheap. No fishing is
attempted in the North Sea. ¥e continue our voyage northward
into the open Atlantic, to the fishing banks at home where so many
rich catches have formerly been drawn out of the sea. After a
few days’ sailing the high, snow-covered mountain peaks rise from
the sea, the echo-sounding has begun to find the bottom, the depths
of the ocean are left behind — we are once more on the fishing
21*