Quotes from ethnographic field interviews
| Theme | Quote | Source* |
|---|---|---|
| *Study alias (not the interviewee’s real name), interview date, and main type of fishing. | ||
| Reluctance to use medical services | The wife of one long time fisher, when asked about fishers going to the doctor for cuts and sprains replied: “But they’ve got to wait for them to get real bad before they’ll go to any doctor with it” | Shelton, September 2000, crabber |
| Reluctance to use medical services; contact with marine animals | This fisher tells of an episode of fish poisoning: “All it was, was the tip of a fin off a rock [fish], it went under that fingernail. And that whole arm turned purple and swelled up. It took it about three or four days. But I didn’t pay any attention to it. It didn’t hurt that bad. [Then] it kept getting worse and worse” | Patterson, November 2000, crabber and gillnetter |
| Reluctance to use medical services; contact with marine animals | One fisher’s story illustrated how they continue to work despite injuries: “[A] half-inch [fish spine] broke off under the skin. That was at 6 o’clock in the morning. I continued to haul a couple of boat loads of fish that day, fish were cheap back then, you know I was getting a nickel for herring but you, you handle a truckload, you could still make a day’s work. At 3 o’clock that afternoon I finally got time to go to the emergency room and he [physician] got it cut out, [got it] pulled out and I went back to the boat, and went and pulled 125 eel pots and my wife raised hell all the time” | Mason, February 2001, gillnetter |
| Contact with marine animals | “The mackerel is so fast, you’d think he’s bit you ONE time and he’s actually done like that maybe a hundred times. And you’ll bleed like a stuck hog” | Tyrrell, March 2001, gillnetter and shrimper |
| Contact with marine animals | “Crabs are just as bad, they’re just as bad or worse than fish. Everything on a crab will hurt you, stick in you, or bite you” | Wilson, March 2001, gillnetter and crabber |
| Mechanical assistance with lifting | A fisher over the age of 70 years explains his mechanical lifting system: “I have rigged a little trolley out there on my dock so that I can hoist them [100 pound fish boxes] up and slide them right into my truck so I don’t have to pick them up | Hargrove, September 2000, crabber |