The cod trap was a room-like structure made of twine. It consisted of four walls and a bottom, with a leader attached to the top and bottom to form a type of doorway. The leader was an essential feature and consisted of a flat or straight piece of twine. It ran perpendicular to the ocean floor and was attached to an underwater cliff which lay along the shore by means of anchors. In some traps, this doorway resembled a V-shape. The following is an example of what a cod trap looked like in the water.
The fish swam along by the leader and entered the trap through the doorway. Once inside, they could not swim back out because of the V. When they hit this, they swam back into the trap.
The cod trap was a permanent fixture that remained in place in the water with the use of ropes and anchors. Ropes were called moorings (morns) and the anchors were called grapnels. The moorings were attached to each corner of the trap and the size of the anchors used depended on where the trap was placed. Areas where there were heavier seas required much larger anchors than those in calmer berths. Large pieces of cork and wooden kegs were attached to the top lines of the trap to keep it afloat on the water.
The first step in setting the cod trap was to put the moorings in place. The fishermen had to find the correct depth of water. In early years, they used a length of line with a brick tied to the end, but as technology developed, in the latter years of the cod fishery, all the boats were equipped with depth sounders which gave them an accurate reading very quickly. The shorefast and the main mooring were the first to go into the water. The shorefast was a rope that attached to the shore and ran off to the main frame of the trap. Next, the two V moorings were set in place and finally the two back moorings. If it was a large trap, a few side moorings might be needed. Then the cod trap itself was put in place.
Since there was not enough room in the boats, called trap skiffs, to carry all the ropes and anchors at the same time, this process often took several days to complete. Crews helped each other to get the cod trap set up and ready to fish. Then the crews went their separate ways. In good weather and at the height of the fishing season, the traps were hauled twice a day - morning and evening. Sunday was regarded as a day of rest and fishing on Sunday did not become a common practice in Grates Cove until the 1980's.
Since some of the areas were better fishing grounds for traps than others, the fishermen of Grates Cove used the practice of drawing for trap berths. A trap berth was the name of the spot where a particular fisherman set his trap for the season. Before the system of drawing for berths came into use, fishermen would take to the water on the first suitable day in January of each year and lay claim to a berth for the coming fishing season. They did this by sinking ropes and lines with a buoy or a float of some kind attached to it. One fisherman even tied a mouse trap to a line to secure the berth.
When it became necessary to draw for trap berths, the first Saturday in January became the designated date. The fishermen would gather in a hall where all the names of the various berths were put in one bag and the names of the skippers of each crew would be put in another. The chairman for the draw would draw out a name from the bag containing the skippers' names. The skipper would then draw out the name of a trap berth from the bag. This would be his berth for the season.
The names given to these berths were usually the name of the fisherman who had first put a cod trap there or who had usually fished this berth. These included:
Jake's Berth - Jacob Snelgrove
Reuben's Gulch - Reuben Martin
Isaac's Point - Isaac Snelgrove
Dan's Cove - Danny Duggan
Jackie's Berth - Jackie Avery
Some of the berths were named for their location, such as
Point of the Motion
Sunken Rock
Heart Point
There are also interesting stories connected with the naming of trap berths. The fishermen decided that they wanted to change the name of the berth known as "Squidding Point" but couldn't come up with a name for it. Wallace Lambert, one of the fishermen, said that they should hurry up because he wanted to get home to watch "Bonanza" on TV. Thus, this trap berth became known as Bonanza. Another trap berth was known as the "Hospital" because all the fish that were caught in this area seemed to have cuts and scars on their bodies.
After the trap berths were drawn, any trap berth that wasn't claimed was fair game to any fisherman that wanted to use it. Fishermen also traded berths if they did not own the right size trap for the berth they had chosen.
Baccalieu Island was also a place where the fishermen of Grates Cove often fished cod traps. John and Joshua Vey were two fishermen that did have traps around the island in the mid-1900's. In the early 1980's, there was a shortage of suitable trap berths in Grates Cove for the increasing number of cod traps and several fishermen used Baccalieu Island as a place for a second or third trap. Some of these included Eugene and Terry Doyle, David Stanford, Walter Sparkes, Brendan Meadus (Budge) and Cyril Meadus.
Baccalieu Island
Leo Doyle Hauling a Cod Trap (photo courtesy of David Doyle)
David Stanford (Jr.) age 13 hauling a trap in the Heart Cove in 1989
Dan Doyle on the way to haul the trap (photo courtesy of Yvonne Noonan)
Hauling the trap meant using two boats, which is why Mr. Doyle is towing another boat behind.