The Solomon Islands and Their Natives

by H. B. Guppy

[145] Ellis’s “Polynesian Researches,” vol. I. p. 146.

The various ingenious methods of ensnaring and decoying fish, which are employed by the natives of this archipelago, would alone afford, to a true enthusiast in the sport of fishing, materials for a small volume. A plan which I saw employed at Ugi consisted in tying a living fish to the end of a bamboo float and using it as a decoy for other fish. The fisherman repairs to the reef when it is covered by a depth of between 2 and 3 feet of water. Placing the fish and bamboo float in the water, he follows them up either in his canoe or on foot. The fish swims along, drawing the bamboo float after it: it soon decoys some other fish from its retreat, when the fisherman watches his opportunity and catches his fish in a hand-net which he carries with him.

A singular mode of fishing, which Mr. Stephens of Ugi described to me as being sometimes employed in that part of the group, may be here alluded to. A rock, where fish resort, which lies 3 or 4 feet below the surface, is first selected. On the surface of the water is placed a ring of some supple stem so as to include within its circumference the rock beneath. No fish on the rock will pass under this ring, which is gradually contracted in size until the fish become crowded together, when they are scooped up with a hand-net.

The following ingenious snare was employed on one occasion by my natives in Treasury, when I was anxious to obtain for Dr. Günther some small fish that frequented one of the streams on the north side of the island. I was very desirous to have some of these fish, and my natives were equally anxious to display their ingenuity in catching them. They first bent a pliant switch into an oval hoop, about a foot in length, over which they spread a covering of a stout spider-web which was found in the wood hard by. Having placed this hoop on the surface of the water, buoying it up on two light sticks, they shook over it a portion of a nest of ants, which formed a large kind of tumour on the trunk of a neighbouring tree, thus covering the web with a number of the struggling young insects. This snare was then allowed to float down the stream, when the little fish, which were between 2 and 3 inches long, commenced jumping up at the white bodies of the ants from underneath the hoop, apparently not seeing the intervening web on which they lay, as it appeared nearly transparent in the water. In a short time one of the small fish succeeded in getting its snout and gills entangled in the web, when a native at once waded in, and placing his hand under the entangled fish secured the prize. With two of these web-hoops we caught nine or ten of these little fish in a quarter of an hour.

As in other Pacific groups, the natives sometimes catch fish by throwing small bits of some poisonous fruit on the water, when in a short time the fish rise dead to the surface. The crushed kernels of the fruits of the common littoral Barringtonia (B. speciosa) are thus employed by the natives. I tried them on one occasion in a fresh-water lake in Stirling Island, which abounded with fish, but after the lapse of two or three hours, no dead fish appeared at the surface.

The use of dynamite for destroying fish, by white men in the group, has led to its occasional employment for a similar purpose by the natives, whenever white men have been thoughtless enough to give them this substance. In August, 1882, I visited a village in the Bauro district on the north coast of St. Christoval, which had lost its chief, a few days before, from an injury to the hand, resulting from an accidental explosion of dynamite whilst fishing. Such occurrences must not be uncommon in these and other islands. In the previous April, we met with a native teacher at Mboli Harbour who had lost one of his hands from a similar cause.[146] At the end of May, 1884, I removed the left hand of Captain Smith, the master of the labour-schooner “Lavina,” who had received a very serious injury of the hand whilst fishing with dynamite on the coast of Malaita. Some of the fresh-water fish which I sent to Dr. Günther were obtained in this way through the kindness of Mr. Curzon-Howe, the Government agent of the “Lavina;” and as I witnessed the operation, I am in a position to pronounce on the hazardous nature of the mode in which the dynamite was employed. . . . . With reference to the natives, there are two very obvious reasons why this explosive substance should not be permitted to get into their hands, even if we disregard the hazard that would attend its use. In the first place, they might employ it against white men and against their fellows; and in the next place, its employment for obtaining fish would tend to encourage the already too indolent habits of these islanders.

[146] Since writing the above, I have learned from my friend, Dr. Luther, late of H.M.S. “Dart,” that he had to amputate on two occasions in the cases of natives who had sustained severe injuries of the hand whilst fishing with dynamite.

I pass on now to the subject of pig-hunting in these islands. Wild pigs occurred in most, if not all, of the islands which we visited. I was frequently warned by the natives, when undertaking a solitary excursion, to look out for the boars, who attain a ferocity which, on account of their powerful curved tusks, it would be dangerous to provoke unarmed. On more than one occasion when alone, I came unexpectedly in the bush on one of these boars, who are in appearance by no means despicable antagonists. When they stand their ground, it is necessary to be prepared for their onset; but as a rule they only indicate their presence by the noise which they make when scampering away. In the islands of Bougainville Straits, where there are numerous plantations of sago palms, the wild pigs are very fond of the fruit of this palm before the albumen of the seed attains its stony hardness. They often select as their retreats the hollow trunks of the palms which have been felled and emptied of the sago. Their habit of frequenting the plantations of sago palms, and of feasting on the remains of the palms that have been lately cut down and the pith removed, was observed by Captain Thomas Forrest in the island of Gilolo, in the Indian Archipelago.[147] On the approach of any special occasion of feasting, pig-hunting becomes a necessary sport with the natives; but in addition, they frequently take to it for the sake of replenishing their larders. With his spear and a couple of dogs, a man is usually successful in getting his pig. The dogs bring the animal to bay, when he is speared by the hunter, who, if alone, at once sets to work to quarter and roast his quarry, and thus considerably lightens the weight he has to carry back. During my excursions, my natives used to frequently leave me when their dogs had roused a pig in the bush; and on one occasion, when, much to my indignation, they had been absent for an hour, they came back triumphantly with two large boars. Captain Forrest, in his account of his voyage to New Guinea, gives an illustration of “Papua men in their canoes hunting wild hogs”[148] off the island of Morty, near the large island of Gilolo. These men are represented with the spear, bow, and arrow, and a dog. Such a method of hunting pigs never came under my notice in the Solomon Islands and must necessarily be rarely employed.

[147] “A Voyage to New Guinea and the Moluccas.” London, 1779 (p. 39).

[148] Ibid., Plate XI. of book of plates.