Heron was a fisherman
Back in the old days we did not do much fishing, they were too hard to catch. Then one night Blue Heron walked into Rabbit’s place with a big string of fish and said he was going to show Rabbit how to do a proper fish fry.
We all thought this was a great idea of course and each of us ran off to get what we were going to contribute — corn, potatoes or whatever. We all ate good that night, but what was really on our minds was how Blue Heron managed to catch that many fish in such a short time while the rest of us would fish all day and only catch one or two.
After dinner we all swarmed Blue Heron trying to persuade Heron to teach us how to fish. Old Man Otter, a gifted fisherman in his own right, watched all of this with more than a little amusement. After much begging and cajoling from the rest of us, Heron looked at Otter, “What do you think?” he asked, “should we teach them how to fish?”
Otter was up in age by this time, but he had lost none of the humorous playfulness for which he was so well known in his younger days. Otter allowed that he and Heron should tell us some fish stories first, so that we would appreciate the skill they were sharing with us. Heron thought this a wonderful idea. He went first and told us the story of how his great-great-great grandfather learned to fish.
A long time ago the Herons and their cousins the Cranes all lived down on the coast. In those days they mostly got by on vegetables and shellfish, which were easy to catch. Then one day Grandpa Heron and his cousin Grandpa Crane came home with a big mess of fish. It seems they were out hunting for shellfish when a storm blew in pushing a rather substantial storm surge, forcing the cousins to seek shelter until the storm passed. Finding a cave halfway up a bluff, they passed the night waiting for the storm to pass. The next morning, with the storm passed and the water receded, Heron noted several tidal pools where the fish were free for the taking.
They brought home many fish that day, and it became a tradition among the Herons and the Cranes who live on the coast. To this day you will see them fishing in the pools left as the tide recedes.
Otter, on the other hand, relied on his speed and keen eyesight to snatch fish from the creeks and rivers where he and his family liked to play. All this storytelling was great but after a time we all began to get impatient. We wanted Heron to teach us to fish.
Finally, Heron took us down to the river and said he would teach us, but we were going to have to work for it. He would not take us to his fishing pool, we were going to have to make our own. He demonstrated for us the general design and we got to work.
With rocks and sticks and mud, we set about to build ourselves a fish trap, while Heron and Otter watched and laughed when we made a mistake. We managed after a couple of days to get it finished. It was not perfect and it was not pretty but it did work. Some of us kept tinkering and refining the design until we came up with what is known among the colonials as the “Indian fish trap.”
The addition of fish to our everyday diet was quite welcome. Indeed, some of our people came to prefer fish over meat, and the delicacy that is smoked trout is famous to this day, among Indians and colonials alike.
Before long we had visitors from all over the Cherokee country coming to visit and learn how to build their own fish traps. Some people from our town started traveling around to other towns and showing the people how to build them. The “Indian fish trap” is even in modern times one of the most efficient ways to catch fish for the table.
Every community eventually built their own fish trap. It was generally a community effort, as there could be an extensive amount of physical labor involved, depending on the location. In addition, making it a community project helped to foster and solidify the community spirit. These sorts of community projects helped to hold The People together.
That, my friends, is the story. The story of how Blue Heron taught us to fish, the story of the famous, some would even say legendary, “Indian Fish Trap.” They are largely forgotten now but some of us still remember how to build them.