Kilchoan Fishermen

Justin Cameron works the Harvester out of Kilchoan Bay. He's a full-time fisherman, with some 650 creels, and his main catch is prawns. The creels cost him about £23 each; with a bit of luck, they may last up to 10 years, but he can lose a whole fleet of 50 in one go in a storm or if a trawler catches them - something the less friendly skippers do deliberately. Where he's using the creels also affects their working life. If he's setting them on hard ground, that is, a rocky bottom, where he's likely to catch velvet crabs, their lifetime will be reduced.

Titch MacLachlan, with his Sylvia T, supports a young family from what he earns from the sea. The new creels he's seen here tying to a line to make a 'fleet' have smaller eyes - that is, the holes through which the shellfish enter - which both deters the brown crabs which damage the creels and makes it more difficult for the prawns to escape once they're inside. Titch will set his fleets along the edge of rough ground, where the prawns tend to collect or, if he wants to catch larger ones and is willing to risk his creels, he'll set them on hard ground. For fishermen like Titch and Justin, setting them out on the flat mud or sand areas isn't a good idea as this is where the trawlers work.

Titch's creels are baited with herring which he buys off the vans which collect his catch. He uses fresh herring in summer, even though the price has jumped from £13 to £17 per box, and salted herring in winter. Normally, he'll lift each fleet of creels daily, but at this time of year he's allowing them to lie longer, for as many as three days.

Here's a prawn's eye view of a tasty herring:

The Diary is full of admiration for these two young businessmen. Theirs is a hard profession, threatened as much by the minefield of constantly-changing legislation that surrounds it as foul weather, marauding trawlers, changing stocks, and dangerous work. They are upholding a long tradition of fishing off Ardnamurchan's coasts, so their enterprise deserves to be encouraged.