A good catch

THIS PHOTO:

Bally comes from a fishing family and has been fishing for almost 30 years

Words and photos by JEREMY FLINT

Meet Bally Philp, a man who catches prawns in some of the UK’s most majestic waters using some of the most sustainable techniques available

Historically, there has been a long legacy of commercial fishing in Scotland where it has developed from a subsistence activity – one undertaken to feed the fisher and their immediate community by the earliest settlers in Scotland, around 7000 BC – to a major food source and export commodity.

During the 19th century, fishing for herring, white fish and fin fish thrived and at the peak of the Herring Boom in 1907, 2,500,000 barrels of fish (227,000 tonnes) were caught and exported to Europe and beyond. Now these stocks have become commercially extinct and the two principal fishing sectors that remain in Scotland are prawn and scallop fishing.

Today, creel fishing, which involves laying dozens of baited pots on the seabed, known as creels, has become one of the most popular fishing methods practised around Scotland. The word creel refers to ‘a device used to catch lobsters and other crustaceans.’ They are made of netting woven over a frame designed to catch shellfish, including crabs, langoustine, and prawns, when they climb inside the ‘eye’ of a creel.

Creel fishing in Scotland mostly takes place inshore (along waters close to the coastline) and is a static fishing method compared to mobile fishing, which involves towed gear, used by trawlers and dredgers.

Today, around 85 per cent of the Scottish inshore fishing fleet are creel boats. These boats are small – usually less than 10 metres long – which means that engine size and weather dictate how far they can go from shore, and how often they can fish.

Bally Philp is a creel fisherman who skippers a 12-metre boat and fishes for prawns in the Inner Sound, a straight of water separating the Inner Hebridean islands of Skye, Raasay and South Rona from the Applecross peninsula on the Scottish mainland.

Bally’s love of fishing started when he fished during school holidays and at weekends. “When I left school aged 15, I naturally found myself working on the boats and spent my

first summer working out of Mallaig on a small suction dredger fishing for razor fish and palourdes, which is a shellfish similar to a cockle.”

Determined to do something other than fishing, Bally tried several different jobs, but eventually found himself back on the boats.

He has been skipper on various prawn creel boats for the best part of 30 years, and comes from a family of fishermen.

“These days I fish local and only target prawns, also known as langoustine or Norway lobster. I work in the Inner Sound of Skye, an area mostly closed to trawl and dredge sectors, and fish exclusively with creel.”

Usually, one or two people work a creel boat, including the owner, and Bally’s crew includes fisherman Haydn Mackenzie. They begin the process of locating the baited creels that have been left on the seabed for 24 to 48 hours.

A buoy marks the start of a roped line on which 50-60 creels are strung. Bally pulls the pots in at great speed using a hauler machine before emptying the catch; up to three or four langoustines can be hauled per cage. The prawns must be at least 20cm in length. Fresh bait is then added to the creels, which are stacked at the stern of the boat. Once the marker at the other end of the rope is hauled aboard, Bally drops the creels at the same place or steers the boat to another fishing ground to release them.

Bally and Haydn cover eight fleets during the day, and nearly 500 creels between them before returning to shore with their prized captures. The live shellfish Bally catches are the benchmark of fresh premium value seafood. In a good year Bally will fish for 200 days a year, although it’s more

Bally and Haydn cover eight fleets during the day, and nearly 500 creels between them before returning to shore with their prized captures

CLOCKWISE, FROM TOP LEFT:

Bally and his crewmate Haydn Mackenzie on board the creel boat; Bally fishes exclusively for prawns; one of the best bits of the job for Bally is being his own boss; the majority of the Scottish inshore fishing industry’s income is made from prawns and scallops; Bally’s boat on the Inner Sound; any undersize animals, or eggbearing females are returned to the sea alive, and undamaged typically 150 days per year due to adverse weather.

The bulk of the Scottish inshore fishing industry relies on prawns and scallops for most of its income. Prawns are targeted by creel boats and trawl boats and scallops are targeted by diving and dredging.

Bally says: “Fishing in the Inner Sound is unique in that there are both permanent and seasonal closures to dredging and trawling that allow us to have higher percentages of creeling and diving than found anywhere else in Scotland.

“Almost all the boats in the area where I fish are prawn creel boats. There is one scallop dredger and one trawler as well as several visiting scallop dive boats.

“Although the fishing industry almost everywhere around Scotland is shrinking, because our area has so few dredgers and trawlers, we are finding our local fishing community is being maintained.”

Bally gets prices often four or five times that of the equivalent trawl-caught prawns and can sustain employment at a fraction of the catch required by a trawler employing the same number of men.

“Not only are creels low impact they are also high value and [provide] high employment. As most of the local catch is caught by creel boats, and creel boats require less catch to support any job, we have an unusually high amount of fishermen in a modest size area,” says Bally. Ultimately, creel fishing is crucial to the survival of fragile, rural communities.

Although full of challenges, like working around bad weather and only making a living when he can fish, Bally loves the beautiful scenery and wildlife. He says: “The best bit of my job is getting to practise and contribute to sustainable fisheries management and evolving the industry to ensure it’s fit for the 21st century.”

Bally works closely with the Scottish Creel Fishermen’s Federation (SCFF) – helping to raise the profile of creel fishermen, promoting recovery of the marine environment, and ensuring that the remaining inshore fishing is sustainable – and deputy chairs his local fishing association.

According to the SCFF, creel fishing is a “profitable, species-selective and environmentally sustainable form of fishing with very little by-catch.”

The SCFF says that target species are brought to the surface alive and undamaged, which means that egg-bearing ‘berried’ females and undersized animals can be returned to the sea, resulting in more sustainable fish stocks.

“The carbon footprint (in particular fuel consumption) is minimal compared to other methods of fishing as the majority of boats are small and fish relatively close to shore,” it says.

Bally agrees that it is one of the most environmentally friendly and sustainable fishing techniques available, he says: “I find the low impact on the seabed and high selectivity of creels make it the most appealing type of inshore fishing”.

With good management of the creel fisheries, limited damage to the marine ecosystem and the return of underdeveloped prawns to the sea encouraging fish stocks, Scotland’s seas could well be fished sustainably for generations to come. S

To find out more about creel fishing, go to scottishcreelfishermensfederation.co.uk