By Micah Dill1
It is a cold February morning, and a man sits on the porch of his cabin near Cat Point Creek, a tributary of the Rappahannock River in Virginia. At this time of year, before the leaves return, he can see out over the water. He watches the water closely, looking for the shiny body of a river herring swimming up the creek on the way to its spawning grounds.
Last year, he brought his grandkids to the cabin. They walked down to the creek and watched as the fish swam by, reflecting the sun on their scales and splashing on their way upstream. The memory lingers, as does the sight of the old dip net leaning against the porch—a tool made from metal wire and bent cedar saplings. It reminds him of his youth, when his family and neighbors gathered each spring to catch the herring . They would come together at night, set up lights, and use these handmade nets to catch the migrating fish . Some were cooked on the spot, others preserved in salt, while the roe would be used to make fried roe cakes.
But those days are gone. In 2012, after decades of declining population numbers, the Virginia Marine Resources Commission put a moratorium on river herring fishing.
His thoughts drift back to his grandkids and to the small dipnet his own grandfather had made for him as a child. Herring fishing had been an important aspect of his childhood, not only as a source of sustenance but also a means of strengthening community ties. He longs to pass the tradition on to his grandchildren, yet due to a low abundance of river herring, and the resulting regulations, he is unable to show them.
A response to declining fish numbers was necessary as commercial overfishing in the ocean, damming along the Rappahannock, and the introduction of blue channel catfish led to the rapid decline of river herring. The government response of total moratorium, however, has had significant consequences for local communities. Herring fishing was not only an important industry but also a cherished cultural tradition that brought communities together and connected them to place. With a team, I had the privilege of conducting oral histories with many local residents in an effort to integrate local knowledge into fisheries management. These conversations taught us about the importance of herring and the impact of the moratorium on local communities, especially how traditions around herring bridge generations. The absence of herring has disrupted these, leaving a sense of loss and disconnection.
memory is the product of inherited experience from past generations (vertical) and from present experiences (horizontal).
During our conversations with residents, it became evident that these processes of memory transmission are reflected in the ecological history of river herring in the Rappahannock. Across time, vertical processes connected different generations to each other, and in time, horizontal processes and shared experience formed social groups that facilitated relationships between humans and herring. This is especially evident in the memory of many of the older participants in our study and their reflections on the generations that preceded them. For clarity, the oldest generation, who taught herring fishing techniques to the people we interviewed, will be referred to as the Necessity generation as herring were an important food source for them. The interviewees will be referred to as the Traditional generation, as their fishing was an enjoyable and community forming tradition.
While the necessity generation and the traditional generation do not perfectly align with conventional generations, the Necessity would be closest to the Greatest Generation, and the Traditional generation would be similar to baby boomers. Finally, what I call the Absence generation is the most recent group, encompassing millennials and gen z, and their connection to herring is defined by a lack of experience. Necessity and Traditional generations illustrate the process of transmission of memory both vertically and horizontally, but this process is broken when today’s generation is absent from the ability to horizontally experience the practices from the past.
In the vertical sense, the Necessity generation transmits memory to the Traditional through stories, and through the teaching of certain practices and customs associated with herring fishing. Members of the Traditional generation shared how they typically learned how to fish, and how to build herring nets, from their fathers and grandfathers. Many of these individuals were children and teenagers in the 1970’s when herring parties were common and fishing was popular. People gathered in large numbers to fish together and children were central to these gatherings. People who grew up on the creek would invite friends from school who didn’t and have them come fish. Knowledge was passed from the Necessity generation to the Traditional generation.
Of course, this vertical transmission is not the only way in which memory is formed and the horizontal dimension also shaped the traditional generation’s fishing community. In fishing together, and continuing the traditions taught by their parents, the collective memory became their own as memory became a combination of inherited and experienced pasts. As the Traditional generation became older they formed their own community with their own children and neighbors. Herring was fished together, preserved together, and distributed throughout the surrounding area to whoever needed, or wanted fish.
Yet a key difference in purpose existed between the fishing traditions of the Necessity and Traditional generations. For the Necessity generation, and those that preceded them, fishing was a requirement for survival. Salt fish, which could be preserved for long times, was the only source of protein for many people during the winter and key to surviving the cold months. Extra herring were used for agricultural purposes, both as fertilizer and animal feed. By the time the Traditional generation entered the picture, modern food preservation, like refrigeration, was widespread and salt fish were not a necessity. Neither was it perceived as healthy. Some people we talked to felt that modern doctors would be upset at the quantity of salted herring consumed by their parents and grandparents. Despite this, the practice of fishing for herring remained important to Gen B. Most people we talked to claimed that this was simply because of how much fun it was.
This movement of herring from a practice required for sustenance, to one that was done for enjoyment and community is an example of Hobswam’s concept of invented tradition. Hobswam argues that invented traditions can originate as practical operations that are formalized and ritualized by reference to the past. Herring fishing is such a tradition that moved from a place of practicality to one of ritual, showing the value that fishing practices had to the community went beyond sustenance. These practices were not any other hobby, but rather a foundational aspect of local communities and to the culture of the Necessity generation. Therefore, they remained important in a time when local food production was becoming less relevant due to modern methods of transporting and preserving food. The community formed out of the tradition of herring fishing, despite the practice no longer being necessary for producing food. The collective memory of this group is the product of the inherited past of this generation, and their experience of growing up and fishing herring every year.
In comparison, however, the connection between the Traditional and Absence generations is vastly different. In this generational relationship the vertical element remains, as stories are passed down from parent to child and grandchild. However, there is little horizontal experience with which to contextualize and understand these stories. The loss of herring plays a role in shaping generational connection by reducing the ability for present experiences, which connected past generations, to play a role in the collective memory of the Absence generation. As a younger member of a local conservation organization said to us, “I have no relationship to river herring… Herring to me has always been something that comes in the little can that my grandfather ate, like that, you know? It’s because they were just not abundant enough.” He makes it clear that his only relationship with this species was through knowing that his grandfather had that experience. Without the abundance of herring former generations experienced, herring became less relevant to younger generations.
The community formed out of the tradition of herring fishing, despite the practice no longer being necessary for producing food. The collective memory of this group is the product of the inherited past of this generation, and their experience of growing up and fishing herring every year.
Not only does the reduction of herring populations play a role, but the moratorium makes it so that any experience of past traditions is illegal. Many members of the Traditional Generation expressed interest in teaching their grandkids to dipnet, even if that meant only catching one or two instead of the quantities they caught in the 70’s. This however, is impossible. Some from the Traditional generation seemed disappointed but at peace with this while others were distressed at the loss of history. One person even wrote about dipnetting in his local historical society’s magazine, hoping that younger people would know how important it had been in the past.
The important implication of this is that these traditions not only connected these generations to each other, but also to the river, and to the herring. The man from the Absence generation who shared his lack of a relationship with herring believed that this issue extended beyond him, saying that society lacked a relationship with the fish. As an employee of a conservation organization, he often works with community members and he sees the concern that arises around species like blue crab and oysters, which are important culturally throughout the Chesapeake Bay. He doesn’t see the same concern for herring, because the relationship has been lost.
Therefore, the story of herring and the current moratorium is not just about older residents who can no longer pass the tradition to their grandchildren, but it has important implications for conservation work. People feel less inclined to protect something when they have less of a relationship with that species. Therefore, falling numbers in migrating herring each spring becomes a cycle, in which people care less about herring the less herring there are, and moratorium makes the resurgence of lost traditions impossible. This concept was reflected in many of the older residents we talked to, who felt that younger people didn’t care about herring as they had never had the opportunity to cultivate a relationship with the fish. While some recognized that young people played important roles in environmental groups and conservation organizations, they also felt that herring were not an important issue to these groups because of the lack of relationship.
For example, the Chesapeake Bay Program does not have a restoration outcome for migratory fish species in the bay, despite their collapse having ecological and social repercussions. Their sustainable fisheries goals do include oysters and blue crabs, both popular species in local identity and culture. In New England, particularly Maine, herring conservation has gone very differently and the state now supports a healthy and sustainable herring fishery. However, the fish also still plays an important role in local communities, where river herring festivals are common. River herring’s importance to the community supported conservation efforts.
Yet in the Rappahannock, things have gone differently. People do not eat or fish for herring anymore and conservation efforts have struggled to restore their populations. Therefore, It is important to consider the role of local tradition and communities in conservation. When attempting to conserve or restore a species, the local community can play an important role. However, as local ecological traditions fade with ecological degradation, the relationship between human communities and ecological environments fades with it, making conservation work more difficult. These ecological connections, facilitated by tradition, play a vital role in conservation, but they are easily lost. For conservation work to be successful, it must consider these connections and the essential role they play in preserving the environment.
- Micah Dill is a junior at the College of William & Mary studying Integrative Conservation and Philosophy. He spent the last year researching oral histories related to river herring in the Rappahannock River in Virginia. At William & Mary, Micah is involved with the Institute for Integrative Conservation as a researcher in the Conservation GIS Lab while also working on a honors thesis about the philosophy of nature. He is interested in how local communities can be better involved in conservation. ↩︎
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