Traditional Fishing Tools: Fishing Spears
One of the most important fish-harvesting tools was the spear. There were a number of different kinds, each designed for a specific type of fishing: there were designs intended for use in combination with weirs, designs for fishing from canoes at night, designs for thrusting from a horse wading in a stream, and designs for winter ice fishing. Some were built for small streams, others for big rivers, some for riffles, others for deep pools. And spearing fish is not easy. One has to judge how deep the fish is, allowing for refraction, so that the spear is thrust fast enough and hard enough to hit and sufficiently pierce the fish, but not so hard that the spear breaks if it misses and hits the rocky stream bottom. View the images below to learn more about the different kinds of spears and how they were used to fish for bull trout, westslope cutthroat, whitefish, northern pikeminnows and suckers.
Colville man holding a fishing spear and reins, and several large fish are hanging off the back of the saddle. The Colville are an Interior Salishan tribe originally located on the Colville River in eastern Washington. Photo © Eastern Washington State Historical Society. All rights reseerved.
A toggle spear from the Thompson Indians of British Columbia, an Interior Salish tribe whose fishing tools were similar to those of the Salish and Pend d'Oreille of the Flathead Reservation. The spear is constructed of wood, bone, string, sinew, rope, and pitch. The handle of this particular spear was cut short to facilitate shipping to the museum. The toggle spear, also called a harpoon, is a tool traditionally used in places where one could spear fish at a weir or other type of barricade or while fishing from a canoe at night. They would light a torch and hold it above the water attracting fish. Toggle spears were also used while fishing through the ice in winter or from rocks in shallow streams.
James Teit, an anthropologist working among Interior Salish tribes in the late 1800s, described how fish were speared with toggle spears: "The spear, which has a handle fifteen feet or more in length, consists of two long prongs, each of which has a barb pointing inward fastened at the end. The spear-head is attached loosely with a line to the handle. When a fish is struck, the barbed points become detached from the spearhead. The fish, with the detached barbed points in its body, is then hauled ashore by means of the line."
Photo © American Museum of Natural History. All rights reseerved.
A three-prong spear or leister from the Thompson Indians of British Columbia, an Interior Salish tribe whose fishing tools were similar to those of the Salish and Pend d'Oreille of the Flathead Reservation. Leisters in varying sizes were employed when fishing for trout and were used where there was some sort of barricade or where the water was fairly shallow as in the Jocko or parts of the lower Flathead River or in the shallow margins of lakes. The spear was thrust straight down, so it hit the back of the fish. The outer prongs spread slightly and then sprang back so they entered the sides of the fish while the center prong went through the spine. Photo © American Museum of Natural History. All rights reseerved.
This is the point of a detachable, single-prong fish spear, which was employed by the Kootenai when they fished for bull trout and other large fish. The angler would throw the single-prong spear to impale a fish. In its struggles, the fish soon dislodged the head from the shaft, which was attached via the string to the spear or angler.
The spear head was made from mountain goat horn. After holding the horn near the fire to soften it, two slits were cut vertically in the base and latter spread apart to form two projecting barbs. After this the end was ground upon a stone to a very sharp point. The head was then fitted to the end of a wooden shaft about sixteen or eighteen feet long. One end of a braided horsehair line [was] then secured to a hole in the base of the spearhead, and the other fastened to the wooden shaft.
Photo © American Museum of Natural History. All rights reseerved.
Traditional Fishing Tools:
Fishing Traps
One of the most important fish-harvesting tools was the spear. There were a number of different kinds, each designed for a specific type of fishing: there were designs intended for use in combination with weirs, designs for fishing from canoes at night, designs for thrusting from a horse wading in a stream, and designs for winter ice fishing. Some were built for small streams, others for big rivers, some for riffles, others for deep pools. And spearing fish is not easy. One has to judge how deep the fish is, allowing for refraction, so that the spear is thrust fast enough and hard enough to hit and sufficiently pierce the fish, but not so hard that the spear breaks if it misses and hits the rocky stream bottom. View the images below to learn more about the different kinds of spears and how they were used to fish for bull trout, westslope cutthroat, whitefish, northern pikeminnows and suckers.
Colville man holding a fishing spear and reins, and several large fish are hanging off the back of the saddle. The Colville are an Interior Salishan tribe originally located on the Colville River in eastern Washington. Photo © Eastern Washington State Historical Society. All rights reseerved.
A toggle spear from the Thompson Indians of British Columbia, an Interior Salish tribe whose fishing tools were similar to those of the Salish and Pend d'Oreille of the Flathead Reservation.
Photo © American Museum of Natural History. All rights reseerved.
A three-prong spear or leister from the Thompson Indians of British Columbia, an Interior Salish tribe whose fishing tools were similar to those of the Salish and Pend d'Oreille of the Flathead Reservation. Photo © American Museum of Natural History. All rights reseerved.
This is the point of a detachable, single-prong fish spear, which was employed by the Kootenai when they fished for bull trout and other large fish. The angler would throw the single-prong spear to impale a fish. In its struggles, the fish soon dislodged the head from the shaft, which was attached via the string to the spear or angler. Photo © American Museum of Natural History. All rights reseerved.