It’s a trap!
We’ve seen these large cages made from wood poles and fencing material for the past few hundred kilometers. We’ figured it was to catch fish, but it really wasn’t clear how it was supposed to work. Most of the one’s we’ve seen are a bit disused and don’t have any fish in them. This one in front of Jesus’ place was all set up.
The whole thing is essentially a fish funnel, with a series of ‘gates’ to try to prevent the fish from escaping at each stage. The end – a little circular area – was jam packed full of sardines. This thing works!
At low tide, a few guys showed up with a net and tried to scoop out the catch. It was a fairly chaotic scene – only one guy seemed to know what he was doing. The rest of the crew was probably wrangled at the last minute. On the first scoop, hundreds of tiny sardines squeezed through the outer net and shot out into the open ocean, leaving a sparkling trail of fish scales in their wake. Still, the guys managed to get more fish than they could lift. Trying to dump the little peixe into an undersized burlap sack meant another few hundred little guys got away.
By the third scoop, they seemed to have more than they could even put in their little skiff and they were clearly done. The main guy told us that he had a few hundred kilos. There were plenty more fish, but that was enough for the day.
You need to visit sao paulo, its a big city, like new york… Its great and beautiful…