0:00:02 > 0:00:05# Now is the time for fishing
0:00:05 > 0:00:08# If you mean to have a try
0:00:08 > 0:00:14# Get your tacklin' ready It's no use to keep them dry
0:00:14 > 0:00:17# Shoot your nets out on the briny
0:00:17 > 0:00:19# And haul them in again
0:00:19 > 0:00:22# And you'll get a funny shimmer
0:00:22 > 0:00:25# In the morning. #
0:00:27 > 0:00:31SEA SHANTY ON ACCORDION PLAYS
0:00:38 > 0:00:42It was night and it was dark and there was about ten men
0:00:42 > 0:00:45who would just pull these nets manually back across the rail.
0:00:45 > 0:00:49The lights of the boat were like sparkling diamonds
0:00:49 > 0:00:52and that's when I realised I was hooked on the fishing.
0:00:52 > 0:00:56There was a certain magic, still is, about it.
0:00:59 > 0:01:03As an island nation, fishermen have always been
0:01:03 > 0:01:05an important part of Britain's heritage.
0:01:06 > 0:01:11For centuries, in an environment tinged with danger and promise,
0:01:11 > 0:01:14fishermen have fought to bring home the sea's riches.
0:01:14 > 0:01:17There was ling, cod, skate,
0:01:17 > 0:01:23turbot, conger, dogfish - every fish you could think of.
0:01:24 > 0:01:27In the early years of the 20th century,
0:01:27 > 0:01:31catches were good and fishermen could make a living.
0:01:34 > 0:01:39But as the century unfolded, a revolution in technology took place.
0:01:39 > 0:01:43More and more fish were caught and stocks plummeted.
0:01:43 > 0:01:47While some fishing communities survived, others went to the wall.
0:01:50 > 0:01:53I started on that ship as a 15 year-old boy.
0:01:53 > 0:01:57And then, I'm seeing a tug towing it away, to go to scrap.
0:01:57 > 0:02:01It hurt. It hurt a lot to see that happen.
0:02:04 > 0:02:07Many of these changes were filmed,
0:02:07 > 0:02:11sometimes by fishermen themselves,
0:02:11 > 0:02:14and through their home movies and their memories,
0:02:14 > 0:02:17we'll discover how the revolution unfolded
0:02:17 > 0:02:19and what life is like now for Britain's fishermen.
0:02:37 > 0:02:43The fishing vessel, the Crystal Sea, is out hunting for white fish off the shores of Cornwall.
0:02:46 > 0:02:52The brothers, David and Alec Stevens share the skippering on board their family-owned boat.
0:02:55 > 0:02:59'We've a good working relationship. Worked together for as long as we can each remember,'
0:02:59 > 0:03:03so I wouldn't really want to be doing it without my brother.
0:03:03 > 0:03:06The job's a lot easier when there's two of you at sea to help each other
0:03:06 > 0:03:08in the many things you have,
0:03:08 > 0:03:10so we are glad to be working together.
0:03:12 > 0:03:16David and Alec and their crew are a rare breed.
0:03:16 > 0:03:22Once, people like them were the mainstay of fishing communities up and down the country.
0:03:22 > 0:03:28But the dramatic decline in the fish stocks has seen the numbers of fishermen themselves fall sharply.
0:03:30 > 0:03:34The Stevens family comes from St Ives, in Cornwall.
0:03:34 > 0:03:37It's a place with a long tradition of fishing.
0:03:48 > 0:03:52The town has always been a magnet for tourists and artists,
0:03:52 > 0:03:55attracted by the light and its setting on the coast.
0:03:55 > 0:03:59And by the 1930s, visitors were bringing cine cameras with them,
0:03:59 > 0:04:02recording all aspects of local life,
0:04:02 > 0:04:05including the thriving fishing industry.
0:04:16 > 0:04:19The fish used to be laid out on the lifeboat slip.
0:04:19 > 0:04:25They'd lay out small plaice, big plaice, turbot and then there used
0:04:25 > 0:04:28to be a man who used to come with a bell and he would ring the bell
0:04:28 > 0:04:29and everybody used to come round.
0:04:29 > 0:04:35Then he would start the pricing. "Give me half a crown" for this line of fish or that line of fish.
0:04:35 > 0:04:39It was hard to get any money for fish in them days.
0:04:39 > 0:04:42People were very poor. Very hard going, all the time.
0:04:47 > 0:04:50This was a world that Donald Perkin knew well.
0:04:50 > 0:04:54Just like his father and older brothers before him,
0:04:54 > 0:04:57Donald was to follow his family into fishing.
0:04:57 > 0:05:00They got me an oilskin and sea boots
0:05:00 > 0:05:06and I would say I was 14 years old. I didn't want to be a fisherman.
0:05:06 > 0:05:09And I wish I had never seen the sea the first time.
0:05:11 > 0:05:15While the men was eating, I was bringing mine up over the side.
0:05:15 > 0:05:18Sick, first time at sea.
0:05:21 > 0:05:25While Donald's family, like all St Ives fishermen,
0:05:25 > 0:05:26hunted a whole range of fish,
0:05:26 > 0:05:30shoals of pilchards had, for generations, been an important part of their catch.
0:05:32 > 0:05:36Well, the pilchard fishery was essentially a big export fishery.
0:05:36 > 0:05:38It relied on the Catholic countries,
0:05:38 > 0:05:41mainly Italy, but certainly the Mediterranean countries,
0:05:41 > 0:05:45who were looking for stocks of fish to eat through the Lent period.
0:05:45 > 0:05:48The fish were caught, cured with salt,
0:05:48 > 0:05:51packed up in barrels and exported in sailing ships.
0:05:51 > 0:05:56When you get into the 20th century, sail is giving way to steam and then motorboats.
0:05:57 > 0:06:00Mounts Bay was full of pilchards in them days.
0:06:00 > 0:06:08I was in a boat over there called Esperion and we had to cut the nets away, we had so much pilchards.
0:06:08 > 0:06:11I forget how many we used to carry.
0:06:11 > 0:06:17I suppose about 15 nets, 150-yard-long nets.
0:06:17 > 0:06:23And meshes, small mesh nets, where the pilchard used to go in and then they would fasten the net.
0:06:32 > 0:06:38In these years between the wars, St Ives bustled with activity connected to fishing.
0:06:38 > 0:06:45There were boat builders, basket makers, fish sellers and people making and repairing nets.
0:06:47 > 0:06:49Years ago, when we were youngsters,
0:06:49 > 0:06:52the older men used to mend all the gear
0:06:52 > 0:06:55and they were called shore captains,
0:06:55 > 0:06:58that was their job. When the fishermen were at sea,
0:06:58 > 0:07:00they would sort the gear out.
0:07:00 > 0:07:04Now, everything is cut out and the ropes are sent down.
0:07:04 > 0:07:06There is no mending of this stuff, as such, now.
0:07:08 > 0:07:13Chris Care is one of the few remaining net-setters in Cornwall.
0:07:13 > 0:07:15This net is for wreck fishing.
0:07:15 > 0:07:20Off the coast here is masses of wrecks, and this is for
0:07:20 > 0:07:24wreck fishing, for fish like pollock and ling and coley, basically.
0:07:24 > 0:07:28When I get the net in the packet, it is 200 yards long.
0:07:28 > 0:07:31When I put on the rope, it's 117 yards.
0:07:31 > 0:07:33That gives the slackness in the net.
0:07:33 > 0:07:36If you had it too tight,
0:07:36 > 0:07:39like that, the fish would not mesh.
0:07:39 > 0:07:43You have slackness in the net, so when the fish go into the net,
0:07:43 > 0:07:45their gills get stuck and that is how you catch them.
0:08:00 > 0:08:06Fishermen all round the coast were subject to the elemental forces of the sea and the weather.
0:08:06 > 0:08:09Theirs was dangerous work, and religion was always
0:08:09 > 0:08:12an important bedrock for these isolated communities.
0:08:16 > 0:08:24It was very religious here. St Ives men would never put their boats out on a Sunday, not out in the bay.
0:08:24 > 0:08:30I was brought up with a Christian family, but I was a bit of a black sheep, I think.
0:08:30 > 0:08:33I used to have a drink now and again on the quiet,
0:08:33 > 0:08:38and then go down and wash my mouth out with saltwater before I went home, so Mother wouldn't smell me!
0:08:49 > 0:08:54As well as the chapels, fishermen's lodges were part of the fabric of local life.
0:08:54 > 0:09:00They were a haven, where fishermen could rest, plan and talk amongst themselves.
0:09:02 > 0:09:05Gossip, all right. They'd tell you what's what,
0:09:05 > 0:09:12and who stole this, and who didn't steal this, and who gave fish away and who didn't give fish away,
0:09:12 > 0:09:16and whose wife was carrying on with who and who wouldn't.
0:09:18 > 0:09:22If we was in here and a woman wanted her husband, she would never come in through the door.
0:09:22 > 0:09:25She'd open the top door,
0:09:25 > 0:09:27like that, and shout in,
0:09:27 > 0:09:31"Dick, Fred," whoever she wanted. But they'd never come in here.
0:09:31 > 0:09:33They would never come in here.
0:09:33 > 0:09:36The same as aboard a boat - a woman wouldn't go aboard a boat.
0:09:36 > 0:09:40She would shout to her husband, but they wouldn't allow her to board the boat.
0:09:40 > 0:09:43Men thought it was bad luck, I suppose.
0:09:43 > 0:09:48They would never start a season on a Friday, cos they reckoned that was bad luck.
0:09:48 > 0:09:52Vicar coming down the quay, that was out.
0:09:52 > 0:09:55And there was a certain furry animal that lives in a burrow,
0:09:55 > 0:09:59with big ears - they would never mention them. They were very bad luck.
0:10:00 > 0:10:05And you weren't allowed to whistle at sea, cos you were whistling for the wind.
0:10:05 > 0:10:07Definitely no pasties.
0:10:07 > 0:10:09Pasties was out.
0:10:09 > 0:10:17I remember, the summer it was, going to sea and next thing,
0:10:17 > 0:10:21thi youngster took his pasty out, and I shouted, "Hey, what are you doing with that?"
0:10:21 > 0:10:25And the skipper, Ron, jumped, he thought somebody had fallen overboard.
0:10:25 > 0:10:28I said, "Look, he's got a pasty. Bad luck."
0:10:28 > 0:10:31He's like, "Ah, don't be so silly."
0:10:31 > 0:10:33And within ten minutes, there was a big bang,
0:10:33 > 0:10:38the hydraulic pipe burst and we drained out all the hydraulic fluid.
0:10:38 > 0:10:41I said, "I told you. Pasty."
0:10:47 > 0:10:50St Ives was just one of hundreds of coastal communities
0:10:50 > 0:10:53around Britain that were making a living from the sea.
0:10:55 > 0:10:59Across these communities, from the tip of Cornwall to the eastern shores of Scotland,
0:10:59 > 0:11:03people were recording their lives and work on film.
0:11:09 > 0:11:12You've got to have an eye for photography, if you like.
0:11:12 > 0:11:15I seemed to have a natural eye for it.
0:11:15 > 0:11:20And you'd be looking to record as close as you could
0:11:20 > 0:11:23the method being used.
0:11:24 > 0:11:26We used to think the skipper's job was an easy job,
0:11:26 > 0:11:28cos he had one hand hanging on the wheel
0:11:28 > 0:11:30and another hand using a camera.
0:11:32 > 0:11:36Donald was just a boy when his father first filmed him on the family boat.
0:11:41 > 0:11:43When I was six and first went out to sea,
0:11:43 > 0:11:49it was to the drift net fishery, which was on its last years, really.
0:11:49 > 0:11:55My memory of it was arriving at the fishing grounds,
0:11:55 > 0:11:59the crew putting buoys onto different parts of the nets.
0:11:59 > 0:12:05There was a big, heavy rope at the foot, and they just lay it to the tide
0:12:05 > 0:12:06for hours and hours on end.
0:12:06 > 0:12:09In fact, they stopped the engine. I found that really scary.
0:12:09 > 0:12:14I couldn't sleep then, cos there was this creaking noise -
0:12:14 > 0:12:17an old wooden boat working itself to death, I thought.
0:12:19 > 0:12:22It was at night and it was dark,
0:12:22 > 0:12:26and there was about ten men who had to stand and use pure muscle
0:12:26 > 0:12:29and pull these nets manually back across the rail.
0:12:29 > 0:12:33And as they came across the rail, there was the herring
0:12:33 > 0:12:40stuck in the meshes, and they shook the nets, and the lights of the boat were like sparkling diamonds.
0:12:40 > 0:12:43That's when I realised I was hooked on the fishing,
0:12:43 > 0:12:47cos there was a certain magic, still is, about it.
0:12:53 > 0:12:56When I was watching him when it was windy, he was unable to lift
0:12:56 > 0:13:04the whole basket, but he was taking fish out of the basket and then putting them down into the hold.
0:13:04 > 0:13:07A chip off the old block,
0:13:07 > 0:13:09I would say.
0:13:09 > 0:13:13Donald Sr is one of a long line of Anderson fishermen
0:13:13 > 0:13:16from the port of Peterhead, on the north-east coast of Scotland.
0:13:16 > 0:13:22His grandfather began working life as a whaler.
0:13:22 > 0:13:26I spent a lot of time in my grandfather's house.
0:13:26 > 0:13:29I used to listen to all these stories, and he stowed
0:13:29 > 0:13:36away in a whaler going to Greenland, in one of the casks they kept the blubber in.
0:13:38 > 0:13:42My father went to sea with me for nearly 30 years.
0:13:42 > 0:13:48My father taught me all about the fishing, the working side of the fishing.
0:13:50 > 0:13:54We went to the same church and...
0:13:54 > 0:13:58Well, he just fancied me, that was it!
0:14:00 > 0:14:06I always say there's only two things could ruin a fisherman -
0:14:06 > 0:14:09a bad engine or a bad wife.
0:14:09 > 0:14:12And if you couldn't trust your wife
0:14:12 > 0:14:16as sure when you were at sea, you were in trouble.
0:14:16 > 0:14:18When I got married,
0:14:18 > 0:14:21it was just a different life.
0:14:21 > 0:14:23He went out to sea and I stayed at home.
0:14:24 > 0:14:27It was the herring. It was all the herring, then.
0:14:31 > 0:14:37As this amateur film from the 1930s shows, herring was crucial to these communities.
0:14:37 > 0:14:42The Anderson family was carrying on a long tradition of hunting the fish
0:14:42 > 0:14:45as it shoaled along the coastal waters in huge numbers.
0:14:47 > 0:14:52They would shoal off the coast of Shetland from, say, mid-June.
0:14:52 > 0:14:56A little bit later, different shoals of herring would be worth
0:14:56 > 0:14:59taking off the east coast of Scotland.
0:14:59 > 0:15:01And so on and so forth, down the coast,
0:15:01 > 0:15:05until you got to Yarmouth, when the Yarmouth herring shoals
0:15:05 > 0:15:08were really at their peak in the autumn.
0:15:12 > 0:15:17As early as medieval times, a principal means of catching herring was by drift nets.
0:15:17 > 0:15:20These were curtains of nets that hung in the sea.
0:15:20 > 0:15:27You used to have a fleet of about 86 to 90 herring nets.
0:15:27 > 0:15:29You used to just drift with the tide
0:15:29 > 0:15:33and the herring used to swim into the nets.
0:15:33 > 0:15:39It usually took you about 20 minutes to shoot the nets
0:15:39 > 0:15:43down before a wind, and then if you got a big catch of herring, it could
0:15:43 > 0:15:46take you anywhere between 12 to 14 hours to haul in.
0:15:49 > 0:15:52In the early years of the 20th century, the herring trade was
0:15:52 > 0:15:56booming, and fleets landed catches throughout the east-coast ports.
0:15:56 > 0:16:03Some of the herring went to make kippers, a popular breakfast food from late Victorian times.
0:16:05 > 0:16:09The fish were processed in smokehouses in and around the harbours.
0:16:11 > 0:16:15# Come a' ye fisher lassies Aye, come awa' wi' me
0:16:15 > 0:16:19# Fae Cairnbulg and Gamrie And fae Inverallochie
0:16:19 > 0:16:23# Fae Buckie and fae Aberdeen and a' the country roon
0:16:23 > 0:16:29# We're awa' tae gut the herrin' We're awa' tae Yarmouth toon. #
0:16:29 > 0:16:33But most of the herring caught by these fleets was salted and exported
0:16:33 > 0:16:37to countries in eastern Europe, where the fish was part of the staple diet.
0:16:39 > 0:16:42Thousands of women, mostly from Scotland,
0:16:42 > 0:16:46followed the fleets, to gut and pack the fish that the men had landed.
0:16:49 > 0:16:54My mother was a fisher, she used to gut the herring.
0:16:54 > 0:16:57They gut it in Peterhead, then they went to Yarmouth.
0:16:57 > 0:17:01When the boats went to Yarmouth, they went to Yarmouth with the boats and gutted.
0:17:03 > 0:17:10They slit the herring up to cut the gut, put it away and then threw the herring into the barrel.
0:17:12 > 0:17:15My mum and her sister, they were the gutters.
0:17:15 > 0:17:18My aunt was the packer. She packed the barrels.
0:17:18 > 0:17:21When you went in, you just saw them all in a row,
0:17:21 > 0:17:25gutting the herring, and the other ones away packing.
0:17:27 > 0:17:31They were happy when they were working, strangely enough.
0:17:31 > 0:17:33It depended how much herring was in.
0:17:33 > 0:17:37# And you'll wish the fish Had been a' left in the sea
0:17:37 > 0:17:42# By the time you finish guttin' herrin' on the Yarmouth quay. #
0:17:53 > 0:18:00Home-movie makers in Peterhead and St Ives were using film to record everyday life.
0:18:00 > 0:18:07But in Hull, Britain's biggest fishing port, filming life at sea had an altogether different purpose.
0:18:08 > 0:18:13Ship owners wanted to improve the efficiency of their fleets, and they
0:18:13 > 0:18:19employed scientists and engineers with film cameras, to document working practices aboard the ships.
0:18:21 > 0:18:24This is the camera that I used.
0:18:24 > 0:18:27I've managed to resurrect it.
0:18:27 > 0:18:34It's an old Bolex, clockwork-driven and, surprisingly, I think it still works.
0:18:42 > 0:18:47Alan Hopper, seen here 50 years ago in the blue bobble hat,
0:18:47 > 0:18:51was an engineer with expertise in the construction and repair of trawlers.
0:18:51 > 0:18:58There was winches running in, there were wires with heavy strains on them, and he used to stand up
0:18:58 > 0:19:04on the fo'c'sle head there with his camera, recording everything...
0:19:04 > 0:19:06for his records.
0:19:06 > 0:19:12I used to think to myself, "Cor, is he going to be safe up there with all these wires swinging around?"
0:19:22 > 0:19:27Ken Knox was a skipper aboard some of the trawlers on which Alan filmed.
0:19:29 > 0:19:36It's funny how you get scientists and people coming from ashore mixing with the deckhands and the crew.
0:19:36 > 0:19:40You used to think, "Don't get in the way, don't upset them."
0:19:40 > 0:19:48But they did a good job, and we can still sit and see them films of us both working
0:19:48 > 0:19:52on technology, and making the fishing industry a better one,
0:19:52 > 0:19:56and fish coming onto the market in a better state.
0:20:10 > 0:20:14Unlike the small-scale family businesses of Peterhead and St Ives,
0:20:14 > 0:20:18Hull was dominated by big fishing companies.
0:20:22 > 0:20:24Hull and Grimsby were large fleet owners.
0:20:24 > 0:20:2610, 20, 30 boats per owner,
0:20:26 > 0:20:30and they were organised in a much more commercial way.
0:20:30 > 0:20:33I think that is the essential difference - the capital nature
0:20:33 > 0:20:38and the business ethos of what was a relatively new business.
0:20:38 > 0:20:44Hull and Grimsby were basically from the 1850s, brand new ports,
0:20:44 > 0:20:47literally, created because the railways were there to carry fish.
0:20:52 > 0:20:57The St Andrews fish dock opened in 1883 and by the 1930s,
0:20:57 > 0:21:01Hull and Grimsby had become the biggest fishing ports in the world.
0:21:01 > 0:21:06The dockside was like a bustling village, with every trade imaginable.
0:21:08 > 0:21:13Hull was a product of the 19th century industrial revolution in the North of England.
0:21:13 > 0:21:20Its fish fed the rapidly expanding workforce in the textile, steel and mining areas.
0:21:20 > 0:21:25In its heyday, more than 50 fish trains would leave the port each week
0:21:25 > 0:21:30and much of the white fish - cod and haddock - was destined for the fish and chip trade.
0:21:33 > 0:21:40Between about 1840 and 1880 somebody, and we don't know who, really, put fish with chips.
0:21:41 > 0:21:43The fish and chip shop was created.
0:21:43 > 0:21:50You could argue that fish and chips was the first fast food and certainly many of the first places
0:21:50 > 0:21:55that utilised fish and chips and fish and chip shops were places like the textile district
0:21:55 > 0:21:58in Northern England, where both man and woman was out at work
0:21:58 > 0:22:02and a cheap, nutritious form of food was important.
0:22:02 > 0:22:06So there suddenly developed a mass market for fish.
0:22:13 > 0:22:17To meet this huge demand, Hull and Grimsby's fishing companies
0:22:17 > 0:22:20found a way a way of using their large fleets more productively.
0:22:22 > 0:22:27They organised their ships into what became known as boxing fleets.
0:22:30 > 0:22:33The people who worked on those fleets were some of the most
0:22:33 > 0:22:38skilled fishermen and seafarers of their age, or indeed any age.
0:22:40 > 0:22:44How a boxing fleet would work, it would sail out to a fishing ground,
0:22:44 > 0:22:50and what they did it was, every day when they caught fish, they packed it in boxes and then transferred
0:22:50 > 0:22:56that fish to fast steam cutters, that ran the fish into Billingsgate in London.
0:23:01 > 0:23:07But by the 1930s, stocks of fish in the North Sea were beginning to decline.
0:23:07 > 0:23:13The success of box fleet fishing would have far-reaching consequences for Hull's fishing industry.
0:23:16 > 0:23:21But for the fishermen at the time, there was a more pressing concern -
0:23:21 > 0:23:24how to deal with the harsh conditions of the North Sea.
0:23:27 > 0:23:31I was 15 in the April
0:23:31 > 0:23:34and I joined the ship in the January, so I was only just 15.
0:23:37 > 0:23:41We sailed from Hull and there was
0:23:41 > 0:23:44the beginnings of snow when we sailed, I remember that.
0:23:46 > 0:23:51Robert Rowntree worked on one of the last boxing fleets, just before the Second World War.
0:23:53 > 0:23:57You used to gut the fish and wash it and put it in the various...
0:23:57 > 0:24:03Medium haddock, small haddock, small cod, and put them in boxes.
0:24:03 > 0:24:07Then the next day, you would get all these boxes, put them in the boat
0:24:07 > 0:24:10and row them back to the carrier.
0:24:10 > 0:24:14They were heavy boats, very heavy boats, not like an ordinary ship's lifeboat.
0:24:14 > 0:24:19You would take the boat into the carrier, tie your boat up,
0:24:19 > 0:24:23and then when you got on the deck of the carrier,
0:24:23 > 0:24:29the bow of the boat came up, whoever was in the boat, like me,
0:24:29 > 0:24:33used to get the box and lift it as best we could.
0:24:33 > 0:24:39They were only five stone boxes, so they weren't always full, anyhow.
0:24:39 > 0:24:43He used to pull it up onto the bulwark and get the box
0:24:43 > 0:24:47and he would then transfer the box to the hold.
0:24:56 > 0:25:01It could be pretty dangerous. We lost a lot of men
0:25:01 > 0:25:06through the boats, because...
0:25:06 > 0:25:11I don't know whether... When you go to sea and you think it's flat calm,
0:25:11 > 0:25:19if you are there in a little boat, it is not so flat calm, it's more of a wobbly, wavy sort of thing.
0:25:19 > 0:25:23I could hardly see over the gunwale of the boat.
0:25:23 > 0:25:26I can remember a very old friend of the family,
0:25:26 > 0:25:31he was in one of the boats going back as we were going back.
0:25:31 > 0:25:37He was passing me and he said, "That will fix you all right, Robert, will it?"
0:25:37 > 0:25:40I could hardly speak!
0:25:44 > 0:25:50Robert Rowntree's experience of danger was shared by fishing communities throughout Britain.
0:25:52 > 0:25:57Fishing was always one of Britain's most dangerous occupations, and this
0:25:57 > 0:26:00made it hard for wives and mothers, like Liz Anderson in Peterhead.
0:26:03 > 0:26:06I used to worry if it was rough at all or if the forecast was bad.
0:26:06 > 0:26:11I used to be glad to see them coming in, because you just worried
0:26:11 > 0:26:13and you didn't know what would happen.
0:26:15 > 0:26:18I never had any fear of the sea.
0:26:18 > 0:26:21I respected the sea, but I was never afraid of the sea.
0:26:22 > 0:26:26I would look at the coal miner going down underground.
0:26:26 > 0:26:28I would have been scared to do that.
0:26:28 > 0:26:32Or if you see the steeplejack going up, climbing up steeples,
0:26:32 > 0:26:35I would be scared of that, but not at the fishing.
0:26:37 > 0:26:42I can remember coming through the Caledonian Canal on one of my boats
0:26:42 > 0:26:46and I really thought I wouldn't see my wife and family again.
0:26:49 > 0:26:51It comes down to faith.
0:26:54 > 0:27:00Danger was a constant problem, but there were others that fishermen found less easy to predict.
0:27:00 > 0:27:02The wider economic and political conditions
0:27:02 > 0:27:07in which they found themselves could have devastating consequences.
0:27:07 > 0:27:10For herring fishermen, like Donald Anderson's family,
0:27:10 > 0:27:14the years after World War One were particularly harsh.
0:27:15 > 0:27:17After the First World War,
0:27:17 > 0:27:21and the Russian Revolution that accompanied it,
0:27:21 > 0:27:25Russia was effectively no longer a large-scale market
0:27:25 > 0:27:28for herring caught in Britain.
0:27:28 > 0:27:31Similarly, in eastern Europe, many of the newly-independent
0:27:31 > 0:27:34countries were keen to develop their own herring industries.
0:27:34 > 0:27:40The kipper becomes less popular, as people turned to breakfast cereals in the 20th century.
0:27:40 > 0:27:44Again, all these sort of features lead to a decline in the herring
0:27:44 > 0:27:51industry which hangs on there, but gradually becomes smaller and smaller and less important.
0:27:52 > 0:27:59Many went out of business, and Donald Anderson was one of the few left fishing for herring.
0:27:59 > 0:28:04He managed to survive by innovating and taking risks.
0:28:04 > 0:28:11In the 1960s he changed his catching methods, from drift, to the more efficient purse, nets.
0:28:13 > 0:28:18When I decided that I would go to the purse net fishing,
0:28:18 > 0:28:23the whole of the north-east of Scotland said that I was crazy.
0:28:24 > 0:28:30The net, whose underside was closed, or pursed, surrounded the shoals.
0:28:30 > 0:28:33The fish were trapped, then scooped out and into the boat.
0:28:33 > 0:28:40Pursing meant that more fish could be caught on each trip than by using the older drifting method.
0:28:40 > 0:28:46I often heard people saying, "This is the way my father did it.
0:28:46 > 0:28:48"This is the way my grandfather did it."
0:28:48 > 0:28:51I used to say, "No, not necessarily so."
0:28:51 > 0:28:56I was always looking for better ways to do things.
0:29:05 > 0:29:09Off the shores of Cornwall, brothers David and Alec Stevens
0:29:09 > 0:29:13are using trawl nets to catch their quarry - shoals of white fish.
0:29:21 > 0:29:23We tow nets, we're trawling.
0:29:23 > 0:29:26Sometimes we work one net, sometimes we work two.
0:29:28 > 0:29:35They brush the surface of the seabed and we create a sand plate, that is what we do.
0:29:40 > 0:29:46We come to the end of watch after four hours. We haul our nets and hopefully we'll have a good catch.
0:29:58 > 0:30:01This is film of the Sweet Promise,
0:30:01 > 0:30:04their grandfather's boat in the 1950s,
0:30:04 > 0:30:08shot by a local home movie maker.
0:30:08 > 0:30:13To catch white fish in those days, the family used a different technique - long-lining.
0:30:16 > 0:30:19Long lining was being introduced throughout Cornwall
0:30:19 > 0:30:22as an alternative to the mackerel drifters.
0:30:22 > 0:30:25This is where you shot up to six or seven miles
0:30:25 > 0:30:27in the extreme cases of long line,
0:30:27 > 0:30:30with multiple hooks attached all along its length.
0:30:32 > 0:30:35When you're shooting the lines, that was the most dangerous.
0:30:35 > 0:30:39If a hook caught in your arm or caught in your jumper
0:30:39 > 0:30:40you would shout out fast.
0:30:40 > 0:30:42Now where the wheelhouse was,
0:30:42 > 0:30:46there were always three knives there on a piece of leather.
0:30:46 > 0:30:49The nearest man would catch hold of that knife and cut the ossel.
0:30:49 > 0:30:53Men did get them in the arm sometimes, but then you would cut the ossel
0:30:53 > 0:30:57and he has still got the hook in his arm, but his life is all right.
0:31:01 > 0:31:08Donald worked for the Stevens family in the 1950s and he was aboard the boat on the day it was filmed.
0:31:08 > 0:31:10It was to be 60 years before he saw the film.
0:31:12 > 0:31:15That's me gaffing the rays in.
0:31:20 > 0:31:24Working alongside Donald was David Stevens, the skipper's son.
0:31:26 > 0:31:29- I used to do all the gutting, that's to take home, that is.- That's me.
0:31:29 > 0:31:31That's you, David...
0:31:31 > 0:31:34not very old there.
0:31:34 > 0:31:37- 12, 13.- Big rays, too.- Good rays.
0:31:37 > 0:31:40We had a big shot of rays down there, I think it was 300-odd stone.
0:31:40 > 0:31:43There was a lot of rays in them days.
0:31:45 > 0:31:47Were you in the punt with father when the punt sunk?
0:31:47 > 0:31:50No. Jim Mathers was.
0:31:50 > 0:31:55I would never have been in a punt, I was always on deck throwing the rays in.
0:31:57 > 0:32:02I was down aboard the boats from being about four, five years old.
0:32:02 > 0:32:05All the time. Father was there working.
0:32:05 > 0:32:08When you were home from school you would be down around the harbour
0:32:08 > 0:32:10and down around the boats.
0:32:10 > 0:32:14That day, the boat was landing, so I had come down
0:32:14 > 0:32:20just like you do as a youngster, you thought you were helping a lot.
0:32:20 > 0:32:23I would have thought it was summer time and I was off school.
0:32:25 > 0:32:31You'd know David was going to be a good fisherman because he was interested in everything
0:32:31 > 0:32:33that was going on.
0:32:33 > 0:32:37He would be looking over the side telling you what fish was coming,
0:32:37 > 0:32:40"Oh, there's a ray coming", or this coming or that coming.
0:32:40 > 0:32:45I think he would have left school at 12 years old if his father would have let him.
0:32:45 > 0:32:48He would be in the wheelhouse looking at the compass
0:32:48 > 0:32:52and doing things and sculling the punt and stuff like that.
0:32:52 > 0:32:55He was a boy that was always interested in fishing.
0:32:56 > 0:33:01The first time I took the boat away to sea, I was only 18.
0:33:02 > 0:33:06My father was ashore, basically having kittens, and he was
0:33:06 > 0:33:10down on the cliffs at Land's End waiting for us to come back.
0:33:10 > 0:33:15That was the first time I took the boat to sea, but when my father died,
0:33:15 > 0:33:20what I missed the most, I didn't have anybody to talk to.
0:33:20 > 0:33:24If I had a problem or something wasn't going right, I had nobody to
0:33:24 > 0:33:28come home, talk to and sort it out. Your mentor had gone.
0:33:34 > 0:33:38- A conger, that is. - That's you, isn't it?- Yeah.
0:33:38 > 0:33:42- Conger's were hard things to gut, weren't they?- Oh, gosh.
0:33:42 > 0:33:43Slippery as a devil.
0:33:44 > 0:33:50In those days, the Sweet Promise would leave St Ives on a Monday, stay out all week
0:33:50 > 0:33:55and return in time to land the fish for the market on Saturday morning.
0:33:55 > 0:33:58The St Ives harbour empties of water with the tide
0:33:58 > 0:34:02and sometimes the boats would have to wait hours in the bay.
0:34:02 > 0:34:06That's out in the bay. Raymond and me. That's me there sleeping.
0:34:11 > 0:34:17That's Len Phillipson's cart. He had a dog that used to go between the horse's hooves called Kyle.
0:34:17 > 0:34:21- The horse was Rose, wasn't it?- Rose.
0:34:21 > 0:34:23- It had more ice creams than anybody. - Yeah.
0:34:23 > 0:34:27That's all ling or conger there, David.
0:34:27 > 0:34:29You'd never be allowed to do that now.
0:34:29 > 0:34:33No, it'd be unhygienic now. Everything used to be on the path.
0:34:40 > 0:34:44The St Ives films show a small-scale fishing community,
0:34:44 > 0:34:49a family affair, where the boats tended to stay close to home.
0:34:49 > 0:34:54Alan Hopper, the marine engineer in Hull, filmed something quite different.
0:34:54 > 0:34:58He was recording larger and larger trawlers,
0:34:58 > 0:35:03travelling further and further out to sea, to hunt for increasingly scarce
0:35:03 > 0:35:05shoals of white fish, like cod and haddock.
0:35:10 > 0:35:14For these companies, staying close to Hull wasn't an option.
0:35:14 > 0:35:18By the 1950s, the local fishing grounds had been so over-fished
0:35:18 > 0:35:21that the low stocks were not worth pursuing.
0:35:24 > 0:35:30Ken Knox, the trawler skipper, experienced these distant waters first hand.
0:35:32 > 0:35:36We would sail here up the Humber, 23 miles from where we are now.
0:35:39 > 0:35:41Although we started fishing in the North Sea,
0:35:41 > 0:35:44as we developed and the ships got more modern,
0:35:44 > 0:35:47more powerful, the further we could go away.
0:35:47 > 0:35:53Of course, the richest fishing grounds for the cod, the haddock, was on the distant grounds.
0:35:53 > 0:35:57Iceland being the nearest - three days. You could be fishing within three days.
0:35:57 > 0:36:01Five days to Norway, to Spitsbergen,
0:36:01 > 0:36:09and a bit further afield would be Newfoundland and Greenland, which would take five, six, seven days.
0:36:12 > 0:36:16The North Atlantic has a reputation of its own
0:36:16 > 0:36:18for bad weather.
0:36:18 > 0:36:24Gales reaching to storms, and the further to the north you went,
0:36:24 > 0:36:27the worse these conditions could get.
0:36:37 > 0:36:41The conditions made life tough for the fishing crew and for Alan Hopper.
0:36:44 > 0:36:48Of course, I was neither a cameraman nor a fisherman,
0:36:48 > 0:36:52but I had been to sea and I had some experience of that.
0:36:52 > 0:36:55I really found difficulty at times in bad weather.
0:36:55 > 0:37:01When there was ice about and things like that, it could, kind of, get rather hairy.
0:37:01 > 0:37:05Ice in itself was not too bad, but then you got a gale.
0:37:05 > 0:37:10You had to send your men out on the deck in these dangerous conditions to chop the ice away
0:37:10 > 0:37:14and keep the ship clear and seaworthy.
0:37:21 > 0:37:25As the fish became ever more scarce, the companies drove constantly
0:37:25 > 0:37:28to find ways of fishing more efficiently.
0:37:28 > 0:37:34Alan and Ken were involved with one experiment that harked back to the boxing fleets of the 1930s.
0:37:37 > 0:37:38Here's some transfer at sea, Ken.
0:37:38 > 0:37:42- Yeah.- You can see we're actually doing this in Iceland.
0:37:42 > 0:37:45On this one, we had to try and come up with
0:37:45 > 0:37:50a scheme to improve the quality of the fish coming back from Iceland.
0:37:50 > 0:37:57A 23-day voyage meant that sometimes the fish were 15-17 days old, which is not the best.
0:37:57 > 0:38:01So by transferring the first part of the catch
0:38:01 > 0:38:06to a homeward bound trawler, that would allow the ship to carry on
0:38:06 > 0:38:11and he would then take a quantity of fish from another vessel that had just come on the fishing grounds.
0:38:11 > 0:38:15My job really was to try and work out the logistics of that,
0:38:15 > 0:38:18the technology of how to do it, the use of these drogues,
0:38:18 > 0:38:22the boxing itself, which in itself was an innovation.
0:38:22 > 0:38:25If you remember, up until this time, we stowed all the fish in bulk.
0:38:27 > 0:38:32And here's the fish room shots, where you can see them boxing again.
0:38:35 > 0:38:39Typical Iceland cod. They're excellent.
0:38:40 > 0:38:45However, these fish were highly prized not only by the trawler men from Hull.
0:38:45 > 0:38:50As productive fishing grounds shrank, tensions grew, in a battle that would eventually
0:38:50 > 0:38:54transform the fortunes of Britain's busiest fishing port.
0:38:56 > 0:39:00The fact that distant water trawlers worked off the coast of many
0:39:00 > 0:39:04other countries, created a long-term conflict.
0:39:04 > 0:39:07That conflict was basically because many of these countries
0:39:07 > 0:39:12wished to take control of the fishing stocks off their coasts.
0:39:12 > 0:39:13They saw them as their resource.
0:39:13 > 0:39:18This led, ultimately, to disputes, which manifested
0:39:18 > 0:39:21themselves particularly in a series of Cod Wars.
0:39:25 > 0:39:28The most famous of these conflicts was with Iceland.
0:39:28 > 0:39:33Between the 1950s and the 1970s, the small, but fiercely independent,
0:39:33 > 0:39:40country gradually extended its national fishing limits, to exclude foreign ships.
0:39:40 > 0:39:44Its navy harassed those that encroached and tried to cut their nets.
0:39:49 > 0:39:54In April 1974, an Icelandic gunboat skirmished with a Hull trawler,
0:39:54 > 0:39:59and as recorded here by a BBC film crew, they collided.
0:40:05 > 0:40:10Skippers on British ships were handed some unusual weapons.
0:40:10 > 0:40:15In normal times, you'd get a small amount of pepper
0:40:15 > 0:40:19and we went to sea and we found out we had a huge bag of pepper,
0:40:19 > 0:40:24and the idea was to make pepper bombs to throw at the Icelanders.
0:40:24 > 0:40:28- And of course... - Would that have fended them off?
0:40:28 > 0:40:30No, no, no.
0:40:30 > 0:40:33It wouldn't have even reached them, I don't think.
0:40:33 > 0:40:39- Then broom handles, these were our rifles.- But not kill them?
0:40:39 > 0:40:43Well, you couldn't kill them with a broom handle, could you, and a pepper bomb?
0:40:45 > 0:40:49The last of the Cod Wars ended in 1976.
0:40:49 > 0:40:53Under international pressure, the British government gave way
0:40:53 > 0:40:57and British vessels could no longer fish within 200 miles of Iceland.
0:40:58 > 0:41:01The distant water trawlers working out of Hull
0:41:01 > 0:41:04lost their most important fishing grounds
0:41:04 > 0:41:07and the industry went into steep decline.
0:41:15 > 0:41:21It was a sorry sight to see when these ships were moored up there, not moving.
0:41:22 > 0:41:27We happened to have on the River Humber, a couple of
0:41:27 > 0:41:35very large ship demolition companies and you could see them slowly being towed down there and scrapped.
0:41:48 > 0:41:54The Arctic Corsair, the last remaining Hull distant water trawler
0:41:54 > 0:41:56is now a museum ship.
0:42:02 > 0:42:06I remember one of my ships and I worked my way up
0:42:06 > 0:42:09from galley boy, decky learner,
0:42:09 > 0:42:13spare hand, third hand, fourth hand, bosun,
0:42:13 > 0:42:17mate, skipper, and in between, two trips, cook.
0:42:17 > 0:42:20I did every position on that ship.
0:42:20 > 0:42:24Then I'm seeing a tug towing it away to go to scrap.
0:42:24 > 0:42:28It hurt. It hurt a lot to see that happen.
0:42:45 > 0:42:49Today, hardly a single fishing vessel comes in or out of Hull.
0:42:51 > 0:42:57But next to the now derelict St Andrews fish dock, is a new state-of-the-art fish market.
0:43:01 > 0:43:06The fish sold here have been caught by Icelandic fishermen in Icelandic waters.
0:43:06 > 0:43:11They're brought in by road from a container port on the other side of the River Humber.
0:43:28 > 0:43:31The old docks employed thousands of people.
0:43:31 > 0:43:35The new fish market, just a handful.
0:43:35 > 0:43:38Machines, not people, grade and sort the fish.
0:43:55 > 0:44:00Alan Hopper, the engineer who filmed aboard distant water trawlers,
0:44:00 > 0:44:04is a founder of this new market, and one of its directors.
0:44:05 > 0:44:09This is my colleague, Orn Jonsson, he's from Iceland.
0:44:09 > 0:44:11He works for a company called Atlantic Fresh,
0:44:11 > 0:44:14which are the principle suppliers
0:44:14 > 0:44:16of the fish to this market at this time.
0:44:16 > 0:44:20It has changed, the Icelanders control their own waters now.
0:44:20 > 0:44:23What's often referred to as the Cod Wars, where the Icelanders
0:44:23 > 0:44:26were regaining the rights to their own waters.
0:44:26 > 0:44:30Again, it's the same fish, but is caught now by us
0:44:30 > 0:44:33and transported to the English market by ourselves.
0:44:35 > 0:44:38We want to take care of our fishing stocks.
0:44:38 > 0:44:45That's often why we say that the fishing in Iceland is sustainable and responsible.
0:44:48 > 0:44:54As the stocks have gone down and we've learnt more about fisheries management,
0:44:54 > 0:44:58it has become a greater and a more well-used science.
0:44:58 > 0:45:02The Icelanders, from my experience, are very far ahead of most countries
0:45:02 > 0:45:05in this whole business of stock management.
0:45:05 > 0:45:09Let's face it, they've only got themselves to manage, whereas around
0:45:09 > 0:45:15the European waters, we're dealing with six or seven countries, who all have got to be managed separately.
0:45:19 > 0:45:23The Icelandic fish is sold here in a fully-computerised Dutch auction.
0:45:23 > 0:45:28Prices start high and fall until a buyer reacts.
0:45:34 > 0:45:37It's largely a silent affair.
0:45:47 > 0:45:52The contrast with Peterhead, in Scotland, is startling.
0:45:52 > 0:45:544.10, 4.20,
0:45:54 > 0:45:564.20, 4.30...
0:45:56 > 0:45:58£50, you're out, £50...
0:45:58 > 0:46:01155, 155...
0:46:02 > 0:46:06Here, the quayside fish market, one of the largest for white fish
0:46:06 > 0:46:09in Europe, runs on more traditional lines.
0:46:09 > 0:46:12140! 140!
0:46:12 > 0:46:15And the bulk of the fish that comes to the market still arrives
0:46:15 > 0:46:19in British boats, including the Anderson's boat, Glenugie.
0:46:20 > 0:46:27Unlike Hull, Peterhead's fishermen never became dependent on fish caught in distant waters.
0:46:27 > 0:46:33Donald Anderson held on to a family business and, in his son, he found a willing partner.
0:46:35 > 0:46:39My mother was determined I was going to do well at school.
0:46:39 > 0:46:44I could have done well at school, but I chose to be at school when I
0:46:44 > 0:46:48had to be, and be in the harbour all the time if I could be.
0:46:48 > 0:46:54It was a balancing act, to keep the teacher happy, my mother happy and me happy.
0:46:54 > 0:46:57The harbour always won.
0:46:57 > 0:47:04When I saw Donald was definitely going to go to the fishing, there wasn't a happier man in Peterhead.
0:47:04 > 0:47:06I was very pleased
0:47:06 > 0:47:09that he was coming in. It was more my term,
0:47:09 > 0:47:12coming into the family business.
0:47:13 > 0:47:16And once Donald Jr had got his skipper's ticket,
0:47:16 > 0:47:21his father lost no time in sending him out to face his first challenge.
0:47:21 > 0:47:25I remember him arriving in the house, my father had come in from sea.
0:47:25 > 0:47:28I think it was Friday and he had just landed.
0:47:28 > 0:47:30He said to me, "What's happening with you?
0:47:30 > 0:47:33"Have you got that ticket yet?" I says, "Yes."
0:47:33 > 0:47:36He says, "Right, you're taking the boat to sea on Sunday night."
0:47:36 > 0:47:38We sailed on the Sunday evening.
0:47:38 > 0:47:43Everybody was south-east of Peterhead, fishing off Sunderland.
0:47:43 > 0:47:49We went down there and there was a huge, huge fleet of boats there.
0:47:51 > 0:47:54Because of my father's reputation - he hardly spoke to anybody else
0:47:54 > 0:48:01and was his own man - they sort of cast me aside.
0:48:01 > 0:48:04It finished up a total disaster, because I went around
0:48:04 > 0:48:07from Monday to Friday,
0:48:07 > 0:48:13like, being behind the brush - too late!
0:48:13 > 0:48:18So with no more a-doing, go home with our tail between our legs
0:48:18 > 0:48:21and land on the Saturday morning was a complete disaster.
0:48:21 > 0:48:24I thought. "That's it, that's my initiation.
0:48:24 > 0:48:28My father, being the kind of man he is, he says,
0:48:28 > 0:48:32"There's no point in me coming back until you've learnt how to do it."
0:48:32 > 0:48:35So I was put back out the next week to do the same again!
0:48:37 > 0:48:41I managed, I think, it was in the third attempt.
0:48:41 > 0:48:46We were the talk of the town. We left on the Monday afternoon
0:48:46 > 0:48:49and we were in the Thursday morning with a huge shot of cod.
0:48:49 > 0:48:52I wouldn't be allowed to land that nowadays.
0:49:02 > 0:49:05On the other side of the country, off the Cornish peninsula,
0:49:05 > 0:49:09David and Alec Stevens are bringing their trawler home.
0:49:10 > 0:49:16Their family has also seen big changes in fishing since the 1950s.
0:49:16 > 0:49:20In those days, they would have landed the catch at St Ives,
0:49:20 > 0:49:27but in 1969, the Stevens moved from the tidal harbour there to the deep-water harbour at Newlyn.
0:49:27 > 0:49:32These days, very few fish from St Ives.
0:49:32 > 0:49:36Then, the family could catch what it liked,
0:49:36 > 0:49:38but that, too, has changed.
0:49:38 > 0:49:41Over-fishing has led to severe restrictions.
0:49:44 > 0:49:46If you think you're over fishing
0:49:46 > 0:49:52an area or a particular stock, you need to do something about it.
0:49:52 > 0:49:57One possible way is to impose a quota, which is the limit of
0:49:57 > 0:50:01the amount of fish of that species that you can take out of the sea.
0:50:06 > 0:50:08Right, let's get down here.
0:50:08 > 0:50:13Officers of the Marine Fisheries Agency in Newlyn are carrying out a spot check
0:50:13 > 0:50:16on the Stevens' boat, to ensure that they're sticking to the quotas.
0:50:16 > 0:50:20- Right, so we've got dory here. - Yeah, dory here.
0:50:21 > 0:50:24A bit of a smaller run this time.
0:50:24 > 0:50:26Getting to the end of the season for them now.
0:50:26 > 0:50:29- That's er... - Prime stuff, lemons underneath.
0:50:29 > 0:50:32Lemons underneath there, OK.
0:50:32 > 0:50:35'From '97 to now,'
0:50:35 > 0:50:41you've seen vessels leaving the industry, as they found that they didn't want to carry on
0:50:41 > 0:50:43and the quota was not enough for them.
0:50:43 > 0:50:46The boats that wanted to carry on have bought the quota off
0:50:46 > 0:50:51the vessels that have left and that's how the industry has contracted and consolidated.
0:50:51 > 0:50:54'It was not a nice process, but it's been a necessary process.
0:50:54 > 0:51:01'We had to be fishing sustainably and within our means, and we're getting there now.'
0:51:01 > 0:51:04Well, in my opinion, the most threatened species
0:51:04 > 0:51:07in the North Sea is fishermen. It's not the fish.
0:51:07 > 0:51:12We can't shoot the nets and say we only want haddock.
0:51:12 > 0:51:15We catch whatever's swimming in front in it.
0:51:15 > 0:51:19We find that we have to dump good marketable fish over the side.
0:51:19 > 0:51:25Someone who's running a boat in the industry now, it's a fine balancing act to keep viable.
0:51:33 > 0:51:38Today, in the face of increasing regulation and declining fish stocks,
0:51:38 > 0:51:42Britain's fishing community has had to adapt to survive.
0:51:44 > 0:51:48The change in our relationship with one particular fish, the salmon,
0:51:48 > 0:51:51illustrates just how adaptable it has had to be.
0:51:58 > 0:52:01Salmon has been caught traditionally on its return to rivers
0:52:01 > 0:52:04and estuaries from ocean feeding grounds.
0:52:04 > 0:52:11In the 1930s, amateur film-makers recorded the popular bag-net method on the Isle of Skye.
0:52:11 > 0:52:14And today, on the north coast of Scotland,
0:52:14 > 0:52:18Jamie Mackay and his son Neil still fish
0:52:18 > 0:52:20and repair their nets in the same way.
0:52:49 > 0:52:54The fish come in here, follow its leader, who would be here in the sea,
0:52:54 > 0:52:59and then they would come up in here through what we call the big door
0:52:59 > 0:53:04and they would also swim around in this area for a time.
0:53:04 > 0:53:10And then they would see this opening, where they would think there was an escape route.
0:53:10 > 0:53:14And just swim around and around in there.
0:53:14 > 0:53:18It's never really changed much in the hundreds of years that it has been running.
0:53:20 > 0:53:23But something fundamental has changed.
0:53:23 > 0:53:31Today wild salmon is a luxury item, for those with gourmet tastes and deep pockets.
0:53:31 > 0:53:38Stocks of the fish, and the numbers of fishermen hunting them in the traditional way, have plummeted.
0:53:39 > 0:53:45The new salmon fishermen don't need the traditional methods, because they no longer hunt salmon,
0:53:45 > 0:53:48they farm them.
0:53:49 > 0:53:53In these stacks of trays in a farm hatchery in Scotland,
0:53:53 > 0:53:56hundreds of thousands of salmon eggs are being incubated.
0:53:58 > 0:54:03My wife is actually a midwife at the local hospital in Fort William
0:54:03 > 0:54:04and she quite often comes home
0:54:04 > 0:54:06and says, "We've delivered one baby or two babies",
0:54:06 > 0:54:09and she doesn't seem to agree with me, but I'll tell her
0:54:09 > 0:54:12we've delivered 2.5 million today, so you've got it easy!
0:54:14 > 0:54:21Essentially, in this hatchery, we take in a large batch of eggs once a year - about 2.5 million.
0:54:21 > 0:54:24We then move them from the hatchery down to the tanks we see here
0:54:24 > 0:54:29and we introduce feed from there. And it's from that point onwards we grow them on.
0:54:31 > 0:54:36After about 15 months, the smolts, or juvenile salmon,
0:54:36 > 0:54:40are transferred from the inland hatchery to the farms, usually found in lochs.
0:54:42 > 0:54:48The industry might look new, but its origins go back a long way.
0:54:48 > 0:54:53In many senses, we think of fish farming, rather than fish hunting,
0:54:53 > 0:54:58as being a modern development. And yet, fish farming is very old.
0:54:58 > 0:55:01Just look around Britain and you'll see the remains
0:55:01 > 0:55:04of many medieval fish ponds, dotted across the country.
0:55:07 > 0:55:13But today most UK salmon farming is concentrated in Scotland.
0:55:16 > 0:55:23The manager of this farm, off the Isle of Skye in the west of Scotland, is Euan McArthur.
0:55:30 > 0:55:33I've been working in the industry for 20 years.
0:55:33 > 0:55:38The changes in the fish farming industry are colossal and we've gone
0:55:38 > 0:55:44from six-metre wooden cages to, as you can see today,
0:55:44 > 0:55:4724-metre steel pens.
0:55:47 > 0:55:51We've doubled in size dramatically, and a lot more automation, as well.
0:55:51 > 0:55:53It used to be all hand feeding.
0:55:53 > 0:55:57You could be hand feeding one or two tonne a day.
0:55:57 > 0:56:02Now, with the automatic feeding system, we have so much more control over our feeding.
0:56:11 > 0:56:16I've been involved with crofting on the Isle of Skye since I was a child.
0:56:16 > 0:56:22There's a major overlap from land farming - crofting - into fish farming.
0:56:22 > 0:56:25At the end of the day, you're still farming livestock.
0:56:27 > 0:56:31With arguments about pollution and the effects on wild fish stocks,
0:56:31 > 0:56:34salmon farming is hugely controversial.
0:56:38 > 0:56:41But fish farming is set to expand.
0:56:41 > 0:56:45Scientists are exploring ways of farming a whole range of fish.
0:56:52 > 0:56:57At the beginning of the 21st century, fish farming could pose
0:56:57 > 0:57:03the final challenge to a community that has faced enormous upheavals across a century of change.
0:57:05 > 0:57:10To face the challenge, Britain's remaining fishermen might need even more
0:57:10 > 0:57:15of the spirit that has marked out families like the Andersons and the Stevens.
0:57:17 > 0:57:20My son's three months old now
0:57:20 > 0:57:22and I don't know if he's going to be a fisherman yet.
0:57:22 > 0:57:26He hasn't told me yet, but when he does talk, I'll have a little chat with him and see if wants to.
0:57:31 > 0:57:33The future could be really good.
0:57:33 > 0:57:37So hopefully, by the time it's time for me to hang up my socks,
0:57:37 > 0:57:40I'll have some young guys coming into the boat
0:57:40 > 0:57:46that have got the same enthusiasm and the same will to do the job as I've always had.
0:57:46 > 0:57:51One of the things that's carried me through the bad times in the fishing
0:57:51 > 0:57:55is it's never been a job of work for me, it's been my hobby.
0:57:57 > 0:58:00We've lost a large chunk of our merchant marine.
0:58:00 > 0:58:03We've lot a large chunk of our navy.
0:58:04 > 0:58:07I think to lose even more of our fishing industry
0:58:07 > 0:58:13would be extremely detrimental to the future livelihood of what, after all, is an island nation.
0:58:16 > 0:58:20# Then I'll get that cod fish with his great old head
0:58:20 > 0:58:24# He said to the decky Get it, cast a lead
0:58:24 > 0:58:29# Singing, windy old weather, boys Squally old weather, boys
0:58:29 > 0:58:35# When the wind blow We'll all go together
0:58:35 > 0:58:39# Then I'll get the haddock So sharp and so shy
0:58:39 > 0:58:43# He said to the decky Hook on the lead guy
0:58:43 > 0:58:48# Windy old weather, boys Squally old weather, boys
0:58:48 > 0:58:53# When the wind blow We'll all pull together. #