In this scene from 1937, a trap fisherman delivers the day’s catch to a cold storage plant in Provincetown, Massachusetts. Trap fishing is an ancient practice utilized by Indigenous peoples for more than 5,000 years, with early fish traps constructed from tree branches and stone. More contemporary iterations arrived to Cape Cod in the early 1800s and soon transformed the area’s commercial fishing industry.
The technique involved setting large, circular traps (weirs) in shallow inshore waters to catch school fish, which instinctually run for deeper water when they encounter an obstacle. These traps were constructed from wooden poles and mesh netting. The poles, up to 75 feet long, were driven six to 10 feet into the ocean ground, allowing them to be fixed in up to 45 feet of water. The netting hung from these poles, forming a wall and a bottom that lay across the ocean floor.
The traps had three sections. Set in a straight line perpendicular to shore was the leader, a wall of mesh up to 1,500 feet long that directed fish into the heart. Another mesh section of approximately 200 feet was in deeper water. The heart guided fish into the bowl, a circular area about 300 feet in diameter. Fishermen would enter the trap at low tide on a small boat through an opening left between two poles. Once inside, they would haul up the net and scoop the fish into the boat. Trap boats were usually about 30 feet with a 10-foot beam, small enough to fit inside the trap but substantial enough to hold the day’s catch, which mostly consisted of herring, mackerel, squid, tuna and whiting.
Provincetown’s first weir traps were set in the 1850s, but the 1920s and ’30s were the industry’s true heyday. During this time, Provincetown Harbor was filled with about 100 weirs. Most of them were owned by one of seven cold storage plants in town, which also owned the trap boats and employed the fishermen. The state leased each company “grants,” or specific areas of the ocean where they could set traps; this arrangement prevented feuds over prime locations.
The cold storage companies divided profits 50-50 with the crew and paid the captain 2 percent of the total catch profit. However, the companies were notorious for short-changing fishermen, who had no insight into the real prices the companies received for the fish. Despite this, most trap fishermen made a reliable living. The job had other benefits, too. Because the traps were inshore, fishermen could spend their days at sea and nights at home. At its peak, the trap fishing industry yielded about 25 percent of the fresh fish available on the Northeastern seaboard. But eventually, depleting fish stocks in Cape Cod Bay led to the industry’s decline. Commercial trap fishing disappeared from the area entirely in the 1970s.
May 2025
