[Author’s note: At the time of this episode, digital cameras were not in common use.To make matters worse, I did not then have a good film camera with a suitable flash. So I have no photographs of this expedition.Today, I would be able to get good photographic coverage. Unfortunately,it will not happen – the fishing techniques described here have been outlawed by the local government to conserve the fishery resources.]

In 1991 I was Project Manager on the Mindanao Development Program, based in General Santos City, Cotabato, Mindanao.When one of my Filipino associates asked me if I was interested in commercial fishing operations, and specifically, would I like to go out on a night time operation involving using nets at one of the paiyaos, I immediately said, “Yes!” though I was not sure what a Paiyao was.It sounded like an adventure to me.

We gathered shortly before midnight at a dark area of Bula, where the boat was beached.There was a lot of activity, men making preparations for the work. In spite of the darkness, everyone seemed to know exactly what to do. I was surprised by the size of the boat.It was very large, with a hull made of heavy timbers. The outriggers extended at least 20 feet on each side, and the deck of the boat was a good 10 feet above the beach.We boarded near the bow, by ladder.We were shown a place where we could stay – on top of the pilot house amidships, where we had a bird’s eye view of the work underway on the deck below – and we were not in the way.Soon we shoved off, the crew heaving on the stern anchor line, and headed out to the fishing site.It was a Paiyao somewhere out there in the middle of Sarangani Bay, about 10 miles off shore.We settled down and went to sleep, curled up on the deck of the pilot house.It would be 2-3 hours before anything happened.

Sarangani Bay is unusually deep. Nautical charts show its depth at 600 fathoms, or 3,600 feet.A flooded Grand Canyon. The inhabitants of Sarangani Bay include all kinds of marine mammals, from small spinner dolphins to a variety of whales. All kinds of pelagic fishes are found here. Tuna,mackerel, bill fish, jacks, you name it – it’s here. These Paiyao are anchored in deep water. I had no idea where we were, but I could see the lights of the boats at many paiyaos.in the distance. We would be going to one of them to fish.

We were prodded awake – ready to place the net.A big purse seine was used.I couldn’t see its dimensions, but it must have been about 60 feet wide, and long enough to form a circle about 75-100 feet in diameter. There is nothing quite as clumsy as an outrigger vessel when it comes to docking, or deploying a large net.But these guys were really pros. They got the net going over the stern, and guiding on a man in the water where the center of the purse seine would be, the skipper gunned the large boat in a circle around the swimmer, deploying the net overboard as it went.The top of the net had floats to hold it up, and the bottom of the net was weighted to make it deploy as a wide curtain hanging in the water.

The man in the water was holding up a flaming torch of coconut fronds, so he could be seen. There were one or two other swimmers holding the deployed end of the seine.This is the amazing part – the end of the net went over the stern right at the beginning of the net – the circle was complete in less than 2 minutes. I could hardly believe my eyes.

The swimmers (pescaderos)wore nothing but breech clouts; no fins and the most rudimentary of swim goggles carved out of wood, fitted with ordinary window glass. (No kidding. These guys routinely dive to depths of 100’ on a lung full of air.) The net ends were secured, and the purse drawn closed with the swimmers now breath-hold diving down into the dark depths. How they did it I can only guess.It was very impressive, especially since the net was full of fish (and God knows what else), which by then were panicking in a swirling frenzy of thousands, each trying to get protection behind the other.

More boat movement, a shouted command and the deck crew drew the net smaller and smaller. Now the surface of the water in the net was boiling with panicked fish, churning the sea into a mass of foam.From out of the darkness another boat came up to carry the fish, which were dipped out of the net, and put into tanks fitted on board the fish carrier. The loaded net was too heavy to hoist out of the water, and it is clumsy to use a crane on an outrigger boat, so it took time to transfer the fish.

But by then, the major action for the night was complete anyway.I later learned that they’d netted over 3 metric tons of fish, over 6,600 pounds. Not bad for a night’s work.We headed back, and got to General Santos City just as dawn was breaking. We were starved, so we went to the fish market and ate breakfast at a small place near the beach. We had – you guessed it – fried fish and steamed rice.

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