Fishing in lagoon
“I will use an old report for the following data. The lagoon is famous for being one of the most dense in the world in terms of the number of fish and the unusual sizes they reach.
The species of fish caught are: the gilt-head sea bream, the flathead mullet, Peter’s fish, eel (which the locals hate) and sole; there are also turbot, goatfish and other less appreciated species.
Since Antiquity, fishermen have observed that the fish descend to the sea at certain times of year, taking advantage of this to fish the same way they do today in the lagoon.
When the current comes from inland, fishing is more fruitful than when from the sea; in this case they have succeeded in capturing up to 20 tonnes of fish per day.
One day in 1891 they caught 14,000 gilt-head sea breams, the smallest of which weighed 1 kg. The best gilt-head sea breams are those caught in winter, weighing 2 kg on average at that time; but there are some that weigh twice that amount. It seems that they can even measure up to 1 meter long.”
Archduke Ludwig Salvator of Austria, Bizerte, J. Rothschild, Paris, 1900 (Prague, 1897)
