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"Tobakeyed Breath"
by: George Van Zant
Jeds father, Joe related this story as he did with many others.
During the 1800's, in Scotland there was a town called Newton Stewart. Most residents were sheep farmers or had other small farming ventures. But in the town proper, resided families whose relatives in the family tree were either Game Wardens or Poachers. The Poachers lived in mutual harmony with the Game Wardens whose only goal in life was to catch the Poachers doing their thing. This was a century old practice that went on continually throughout the towns existence.
The Poachers had a practice of selling their game or fish door to door which pleased everybody including the Game Warden families. After all the Wardens werenąt concerned about the booty unless they could catch them red-handed on the spot ,actually breaking the law. The Game Wardens were all employed by the Lord Galloway Estate and which being off limits was a bonanza of game for the Poachers.
During the 1800's, in Scotland there was a town called Newton Stewart. Most residents were sheep farmers or had other small farming ventures. But in the town proper, resided families whose relatives in the family tree were either Game Wardens or Poachers. The Poachers lived in mutual harmony with the Game Wardens whose only goal in life was to catch the Poachers doing their thing. This was a century old practice that went on continually throughout the towns existence.
The Poachers had a practice of selling their game or fish door to door which pleased everybody including the Game Warden families. After all the Wardens werenąt concerned about the booty unless they could catch them red-handed on the spot ,actually breaking the law. The Game Wardens were all employed by the Lord Galloway Estate and which being off limits was a bonanza of game for the Poachers.
Nelson Stewart in the 1800s
This story is about the Cree River that flowed through the town from inside the Estate.
The river from the ocean was fairly wide to the Estate and from its course through the Estate it became very much narrower. This of course made it easy for poaching because the salmon were constricted to a point where the Poachers could hide in the bushes and catch their loot much easier than they could outside the Estate. But a #40 pound salmon can put up one
heck of battle especially when they were fighting at the other end of a hand line.
We all know the "sulking habits" of salmon. They are actually resting at this point and recover quickly after the initial hookup for further battling. This was a real problem for the Poachers. They had to keep the fish from sulking and get the fish immediately to the bank before they were caught. So they either made the salmon fight quickly to his expiration or risk arrest by the ever present Wardens.
Somebody of the town populace, a long time before, found out that salmon hate nicotine and would literally kill themselves to escape the presence of tobacco. The women poachers knowing this sewed cloth bags into shapes like the old Bull Durham sacks. They collected cigarette butts and pipe tobacco from the towns trash and loaded the sacks with their tobacco debris and placed a rock in the sack for weight. After the hook-up and the salmon
stopped his initial run, the Poacher slid the sack down the line to the salmons mouth where he breathed in the tobacco with each resting breath. The instant the salmon detected the tobacco he went crazy and very quickly demised himself and the Poacher was out of the Estate quickly back to town going from door to door for a sale.
When the poacher presented the salmon at the door to the village women most of them opened the salmons mouth and smelled inside. If the salmon had been "tobackeyed" it supposedly spoiled the rest of the meat, so most turned it down "Who wants a tobackeyed fish and all that spoiled meat?"
An afterthought
By the way, Jeds father Joe was named after his father Joe, who in turn was named after his father Joe. What the heck happened to Jed? Jeds mom must have eaten tobackeyed salmon when the time came to name her new son.
The river from the ocean was fairly wide to the Estate and from its course through the Estate it became very much narrower. This of course made it easy for poaching because the salmon were constricted to a point where the Poachers could hide in the bushes and catch their loot much easier than they could outside the Estate. But a #40 pound salmon can put up one
heck of battle especially when they were fighting at the other end of a hand line.
We all know the "sulking habits" of salmon. They are actually resting at this point and recover quickly after the initial hookup for further battling. This was a real problem for the Poachers. They had to keep the fish from sulking and get the fish immediately to the bank before they were caught. So they either made the salmon fight quickly to his expiration or risk arrest by the ever present Wardens.
Somebody of the town populace, a long time before, found out that salmon hate nicotine and would literally kill themselves to escape the presence of tobacco. The women poachers knowing this sewed cloth bags into shapes like the old Bull Durham sacks. They collected cigarette butts and pipe tobacco from the towns trash and loaded the sacks with their tobacco debris and placed a rock in the sack for weight. After the hook-up and the salmon
stopped his initial run, the Poacher slid the sack down the line to the salmons mouth where he breathed in the tobacco with each resting breath. The instant the salmon detected the tobacco he went crazy and very quickly demised himself and the Poacher was out of the Estate quickly back to town going from door to door for a sale.
When the poacher presented the salmon at the door to the village women most of them opened the salmons mouth and smelled inside. If the salmon had been "tobackeyed" it supposedly spoiled the rest of the meat, so most turned it down "Who wants a tobackeyed fish and all that spoiled meat?"
An afterthought
By the way, Jeds father Joe was named after his father Joe, who in turn was named after his father Joe. What the heck happened to Jed? Jeds mom must have eaten tobackeyed salmon when the time came to name her new son.
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Added: Fri Sep 05 2008
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