Fish Bait, Lipstick and Glitter!

The Bay is full of menhaden! By full..I mean literally full! There are so many of these little fish swimming around that it is hard to find an area that is not silver! Menhaden..pogy..bunker..all names for the same little silvery-colored fish that the locals use as fishbait. Here on the Bayou, too, though not an apt name..they are called "sardines"..not to be confused with the nasty little fishies in the tins. But names aside, we are going to look at the uses of this prolific fishy! First off, as mentioned above, menhaden are prized among local fishermen as bait. With these, you can catch a broad range of fish..speckled seatrout, red drums, sheephead, flounder and just about any other fish that happens to be swimming around in the water! The optimal size to use as bait would be about three inches in length and at the moment, that size is what is schooling en masse in the Bay! Catching enough menhaden to use as bait is as simple as tossing a net. The only trouble with so many of them being in the water....the larger fish are full! My niece's son once said, "There are so many sardines in the Bay that a fish just has to yawn and he will be full!" Enough said...that description fully fits!

A net full of Menhaden!

These same fishes are used in a variety of personal products and health products as well. They are one of the oiliest fish to be found which accounts for them being the main source of omega-3 oils for human consumption. The "Pogy Boats" that catch the fish use large trawls to catch millions of the little fish each day. Some of these will also go into cat food and livestock feed. This is understandable and not surprising at all but what sort of does surprise me..is that this same fish oil is used as a base for most lipsticks! Ugh! Call me weird, but now I know just why I have never felt compelled to wear the stuff! Why in the world would I want to rub a fish on my lips! Yes, I eat fish but somehow the other just sounds sort of nasty!

Menhaden are also a tasty treat that I can feed my Bayou friends like this Night Heron!

Then we come to a suggestion that might have merit to someone like me! My sister-in-law was on the pier the other day as I was throwing the net for shrimp. With so many of the "sardines" in the Bay, it was inevitable that I was catching bucketfuls of the little guys with each throw. They would flip-flop around on the pier while I patiently picked out the shrimp. Then I would start tossing the minnows back in the water. Their vigorous flipping caused each one to lose a multitude of tiny scales that glistened in the sunlight. Cynthia looked at the pier boards that now sparkled with the minute scales. "This looks just like glitter! Why can't you make your own glitter from these scales?" she asked. I thought for a moment but no snappy comeback entered the brain. I shrugged my shoulders and sort of grunted something that was supposed to sound like an intelligent answer when in reality, a simple "I don't know" would have sufficed. Glitter! I could just imagine me trying to collect enough scales to fill a bottle! Glitter..well..it WAS sparkly!