Barges and Pennants

 

 

 

 


The Courland Barges

It can be assumed that about 450 large barges having a pennant were beating about the Courland Lagoon around 1929. Fishing barges differed in magnitudes and the kind of fishing net that was used. A large barge to a length of 13 Meters could fish a net called “Keitel”-net. The barge would be called then “Keitelkahn” – (kahn= barge). This net could be pulled by one boat alone. Other nets required two sailing vessels for towing the net between them. Fishing often took place at night, though some sorts of fishing could only be done in the daylight, especially when the barge needed to maneuver near the shore in the shallow water.

The outline of the barges with their wooden pennants has been a characteristic view on the Courland Lagoon. What looks for the painters like a romantic subject, has been a deadly serious part of the way fishermen made their living. Fishing was - and is still - a back-breaking work and quite dangerous. My father told me that every morning some of the fishermen met at the shore of the lagoon and discussed the probable development of the weather. I’ve never been able to understand that fully till I’ve visited the spit myself. The weather is highly unstable and can change within the hour; this is because the position between two water bodies causes very difficult weather conditions. So a storm could arise very quickly and the conditions for any fishing at night are far more difficult than in broad daylight. The cemetery could tell.

 

Nidden, photo by Victor Moslehner © Brigitte Bean