The Fishy Smiths

by Mike Bruton

  JLB was clearly aware of the dangers of explosives as he once said to Flora shortly before they left on an expedition, ‘If we don’t come back, please look after William’ (I Sholto-Douglas, pers. comm., 2016). He may generally have used explosives carefully and effectively, but one wonders what impression he made on local fishermen who witnessed this brutally efficient method of ‘fishing’? He does discuss the ethical issue of the impression his methods created in ‘the minds of primitive people’ and was obviously concerned about it. He wrote:

  ‘One of our great troubles in using explosives in our work was the way in which we excited the natives, who, with their primitive tackle and traps, rarely got much. They saw this white man throw a small object into the sea, there was a boom and a splash, and sometimes the water would be covered with lovely fish. How easy and simple it appeared’ (Smith, 1956).

  His use of explosives was certainly effective. He reported on an expedition to Pinda in 1950:

  ‘On one occasion I put down a large bomb in deepish water on a reef where natives commonly fish from canoes. Among those killed was a large black fish (Macolor niger), some specimens of 15 lbs. This is a predatory fish, a flesh-eater, with large mouth, and yet the natives of that area, with fishing tradition of several hundreds of years, did not know it and had never seen one, though it must have been there all the time’ (Smith, 1951b).

  He observed (1955) that within three months, he was able to collect more species of fish off Zanzibar than Colonel Lambert Playfair, author (with Albert Günther) of the standard treatise on Zanzibar fishes, who had collected there over ‘many years’.

  Explosives can now be made from readily available ingredients, such as diesel fuel, nitrogen-based soil fertilisers and the powdered urea foam that is used in boat building, mixed with small amounts of gasoline and gunpowder (Stobbs, 1997). Recipes for explosives are readily available on the internet, so they are potentially available to anyone. As a result, their use is increasing despite the fact that they are banned.

  Today, blast fishing with explosives, together with deep-set gill nets targeting sharks, represents one of the major threats to marine animal communities in the Western Indian Ocean (and elsewhere). Blasting is arguably the most senseless form of fishing as, if it is used incorrectly, it instantly destroys coral and rocky reef communities that may have taken millennia to develop. Branching corals, such as Acropora species, are particularly vulnerable to blast fishing as they are reduced to useless rubble. In addition, this fishing method is indiscriminate and wasteful as many fishes and invertebrates that humans do not use are also killed (Richmond, 2011; Bruton, 2016).

  While diving in the Jago submersible at depths of 170 metres off Grande Comore in 2008, coelacanth researchers Hans Fricke and Jürgen Schauer felt the jolt of dynamite depth charges being discharged by fishermen near the water surface. If the typical pattern of ‘development’ of rural fisheries is followed in the Comoros, i.e. the replacement of traditional methods – harvesting fishes and other aquatic animals relatively sustainably, mainly because of their inefficiency – with dynamiting and deep-set gill nets, this will represent a serious threat to coelacanths and other marine life (Bruton, 2016).

  On their 1951 expedition, in addition to doing their own collecting, the Smiths also frequented local fish markets and inspected the catches from the traps and nets of local fishermen, often finding valuable specimens. JLB usually worked with the marinheiros out at sea, ‘bombing’ fishes, whereas Margaret worked inshore.

  ‘Margaret Smith was dressed in a bright green romper affair, which caused much consternation among the local populace and whom she watched merrily out of the corner of her eye. Slung across her left shoulder and hanging low on her right hip she carried a canvas pouch. This was divided into sections, in each of which reposed sundry jars and test tubes. A long pair of tweezers clung to the pouch and about her waist was strapped a large hunting knife. … Margaret Smith recognised the more precious [fishes] immediately and these were put into test tubes taken from the canvas pouch. Some were so minute that they were picked up with tweezers’ (Barnett, 1953).

  She would take a group of marinheiros with her along the beach to sample small fishes in intertidal pools at low tide, using a fish poison made from the ‘pounded bark of a forest tree’ (Smith, 1968b), and known as warrula. This is made by local people by stripping and pulping the bark of the warrula tree, also known as the fish-poison-vine, Tephrosia vogelii, a small tree that is indigenous to and widespread in tropical Africa and is extensively used to kill insect pests as well as fishes (Bruton, 2016). After blocking any outlets from an intertidal pool with rocks, Margaret would scatter handfuls of the pulp onto the pool and then stir it with a warrula branch. Within minutes the fishes would start swimming erratically and then flap about helplessly on the water surface, where they could be scooped up with a hand net.1

  Margaret Smith in fish-collecting gear on an expedition to Mozambique in 1951.

  In addition to explosives and poisons, Smith used some other unconventional methods to collect fishes.

  ‘I had to go and get the material myself, and for many years I tramped shores, searched the rock-pools, talked all sorts of people into collecting, went to sea with line boats and lived through the misery of trawlers in bad weather. Once I found a colony of cormorants’ nests accessible, and as soon as a parent had fed a baby, I made it disgorge and got some most interesting and unexpected specimens that way. Hunting one’s own material takes you off the beaten track, to natural beauties known to few, as well as to unpleasant, unhealthy and uncomfortable places. You meet many queer people and you learn a good many things besides ichthyology’ (Smith, 1949b).

  In a 1997 Ichthos article, journalist Audrey Ryan mentions that JLB Smith even used a gun ‘for shooting specimens out of the water’, and Smith (1951b) mentions that they removed live coral heads and broke them up with hammers to retrieve the small fishes hidden inside.

  The use of rewards to encourage fishermen to catch coelacanths was also novel and somewhat controversial, but it did serve to raise awareness about fish, and JLB’s £100 reward led directly to his securing the second coelacanth specimen. His example was soon followed by others: the French doubled the reward (for a live coelacanth) to £200 in 1953 and the American government offered $5,000 for a specimen, a hefty bounty for any fish over 60 years ago. In 1975 the Steinhart Aquarium even offered a reward of a two-week round trip to Mecca for a lucky Muslim coelacanth fisherman!

  1Warrula may also refer to various tropical climbing plants that have been introduced into Africa from Asia and the Pacific islands, such as beach-poison-vine, Derris trifoliata, which was formerly used as an organic pesticide to control agricultural pests and is still used in rural areas as a fish poison. Other plants that are widely used to produce fish poisons in tropical Africa include the physic nut tree (Jatropha curcas, also an introduced alien species), various euphorbias, especially milkbush (Euphorbia tirucalli), violet tree (Securidaca longepedunculata), snake bean (Swartzia madagascariensis) and tamboti (Spirostachys africana). The African dream herb (Entada rheedii), whose large brown seed pods (entada beans) are often found along the East African coast, is also crushed and used as fish poison (Bruton, 2016).

  CHAPTER 15

  Jubilation

  Publication of The Sea Fishes of Southern Africa

  IN 1940 the publication of Austin Roberts’ famous The Birds of South Africa had introduced the concept of natural history field guides that documented the wildlife of a particular region. This book had inspired mining magnate and keen angler, Hugh le May, to think about producing a similar book on southern African sea fishes, but he realised that this would require the skills of a scientist. He discussed the idea with his Johannesburg accountant, Bransby A Key, another keen natural historian. On 26th September 1945 Key wrote to JLB Smith and outlined Le May’s idea for a book with colour illustrations that would resolve the confusion surrounding the scientific and common names of local fishes. ‘One
fish for example had no less than 14 common names around our coast’ (MM Smith, 1987). Key also indicated that an amount of £1,000 would be made available by Hugh le May for the production of the book (Smith, 1956; Bell, 1969; Gon, 2001).

  After careful thought, and while conducting research for the planned book, Smith accepted Hugh le May’s offer but told him that £1,000 would not be enough. Le May’s financier Key replied that finding a competent author was much more important than any budgetary issues, and that funds would be made available. Key then contacted John Voelcker, the leading businessman who had been involved in the production of Roberts’ bird book through what came to be known as the John Voelcker Bird Book Fund, and persuaded him to join the fish book venture (Gon, 2001). In 1946 they created a trust, the Sea Fishes of Southern Africa Book Fund, which was chaired by Voelcker, with Key as the Honorary Secretary. Other members included Hugh le May, Guy Carlton Jones and James H Crosby, all leading businessmen. In late 1947, as part of the fundraising campaign, the Smiths exhibited the colour plates that had been prepared for the book in Johannesburg and raised a further £9,000 (Gon, 2001).

  JLB and Margaret Smith worked extremely hard in the late 1940s to complete the first Sea Fishes of Southern Africa book. Margaret’s responsibilities, apart from protecting ‘the professor’, included attending to the voluminous correspondence, answering every letter received no matter how trivial, cataloguing the rapidly growing library holdings, and producing the endless illustrations of fishes. As the fish collection and library holdings increased, the fledgling Department of Ichthyology ran out of space. According to Peter Jackson (1996), Joseph Omer-Cooper, Professor of Zoology at Rhodes University College (RUC) at the time, likened Ichthyology to ‘the camel that asked its master if it may put its head inside his tent during a desert storm, and little by little got more and more of itself inside until it eventually occupied the whole tent’.

  Jackson (1996) witnessed this phase of their work:

  ‘At that time they were very much alone. Apart from the young artists I cannot remember anyone assisting them for very long in their ceaseless beaver-like preparation of the book … Smith’s single-minded zealotry had earned him a reputation of eccentricity among his colleagues, but to a young student the dragon was his wife. Her role as a helpmeet in those days is well documented but what is less known is the Cerberus-like vigilance with which she protected her husband’s person. Students seemed to exist for the express purpose of “wasting the Professor’s precious time” as she put it. “What do you want to see him for?” she would demand, with a stare that would freeze a basilisk. “Let them come in, lass” would come a quiet voice inside the famous cottage on Rhodes campus where they worked. With a hissed “Don’t be too long, now” she would grudgingly admit me to the presence’.

  Nancy Tietz (pers. comm., 2017) had a similar experience:

  ‘When one visited the Ichthyology Department in the old wood & iron building one did not get much further than Doris Cave, the library and the coelacanth (Malania) near the entrance. In the company of Richard Liversedge [then Director of the McGregor Museum in Kimberley] on my first visit I was received by Margaret in what was known to all at Rhodes as the “Inner Sanctum” while Richard was allowed to approach the Professor in what was known as the “Holy of Holies”. After that JLB would come through to see me in the Inner Sanctum (Margaret’s laboratory) but when I moved to Grahamstown I was always ushered into the Holy of Holies, much to my surprise I might add.’

  Having provided financial support for the production of the book, Hugh and Basil le May later also offered support for a new building for the Department of Ichthyology after Hugh visited Grahamstown in November 1947. He was appalled by the cramped and unhealthy working conditions in the Department of Ichthyology that he had helped to establish. At that time Smith occupied the study of Professor Joseph Omer-Cooper, Head of Zoology, and was promised the use of a garage on campus to store his priceless fish collection (Gon, 2002)! Smith explained that he had often complained to the College authorities that the poor state of repair of the building interfered with his research, and had repeatedly asked for better accommodation. In a letter to Le May dated 4th March 1948 he wrote, ‘I have never had a decent place to work in … always had to manage in corners’.

  Judging by correspondence 20 years later between Margaret Smith and Basil le May, Hugh had quietly but effectively convinced the authorities at RUC and the CSIR of the importance of supporting JLB’s work. The Le Mays’ support and generosity, both moral and financial, could not be ignored at a time when RUC was virtually bankrupt (Gon, 2001; Maylam, 2017). This, combined with Smith’s productivity as a scientist, his success as a fundraiser and the huge publicity generated by the first coelacanth, made it clear to all concerned that it was time to establish a Department of Ichthyology and provide a decent building to house it. RUC was effectively JLB’s employer and also covered the operating costs of his Department, and the CSIR provided his research grants.

  However, in the late 1940s the relationship between Smith and Hugh le May started to sour. Hugh le May’s offer to fund a new laboratory for Smith eventually fell through due to disagreements between the two men and the precarious state of the South African and world economies (Gon, 2002). Their relationship reached a new low on 16th November 1948 when Smith wrote to Le May, ‘Please don’t send me any more unpleasant letters. I think you have been misunderstanding me. I am not chasing after you for money.’

  The main point of contention was that Le May did not want any publicity to accompany his donations (to the book or the laboratory), yet Smith insisted on going public with plans to acknowledge Le May’s donations to both projects. A plan for Le May to sponsor the establishment of a field laboratory on Inhaca Island in Mozambique also collapsed when it became clear that it was to be named after him (Gon, 2002). JLB Smith did not seem to comprehend that Le May was a very modest man who shied away from publicity and disliked flattery. In contrast, Smith regarded publicity as a means to obtain more support for his work, and wasn’t averse to the occasional use of flattery. Gon (2002) argues that flattery was ‘an integral part of his personality’; he liked to please his benefactors and could not stop himself from doing so (with the encouragement of Margaret).

  In spite of their dislike of publicity, the Le Mays’ contribution to ichthyology was generous and sustained. In 1969 Margaret Smith would write to Basil, who had by then taken over the chairmanship of the book fund, to ask him for financial support for the new Ichthyology Institute. He acceded to her request and also accompanied Margaret on her first visit to the Department of National Education, which eventually led to the Institute’s being established as a Declared Cultural Institution (effectively a national museum funded by the government).

  In one of the more bizarre episodes in JLB’s life, and in the midst of publishing his magnum opus, Le May’s potential sponsorship of a new fish research laboratory at RUC was cancelled when Smith unexpectedly resigned from the College in November 1949 to take up a position as Director of the Natal Museum in Pietermaritzburg. He then promptly changed his mind when the museum refused to accede to his various conditions of employment, decided to stay in Grahamstown, and asked the College to take him back (which they did)!

  Smith described this career move, as if it had already happened, in a letter dated 14th November 1949 to Frank Reid, who edited the newsletter of the Cape Town school, Bishops.

  ‘After having initially turned it down, I eventually accepted the invitation of the [Trustees] of the Natal Museum to become director of that institution, and shall take over from the beginning of next year. It has been quite a wrench uprooting here, but there are so many opportunities for my researches in Natal and so many people who have for long been eager that I should come there, that work has won. At some later date I shall be making on behalf of the Museum an official announcement about the plans I have for developing various lines of research.’

  But he did not leave Grahamstown, and continued
working there until his death nearly 20 years later!

  Smith realised that it would be impossible to prepare a book about sea fishes without artists to illustrate the fishes. His first attempt to illustrate his own research papers in 1931 had met with ridicule, but he practised hard and managed to illustrate all his own work until 1941. The scale and expectations of the new book project demanded illustrations well beyond JLB’s capacity, and he realised that he would have to adopt a different, more ambitious strategy. It was his dictum that ‘A good illustration is better than a whole volume of text’.

  Much later, Margaret recalled the events, and the results thereof:

  ‘When we received the letter early in October 1945, J.L.B. said that he could not possibly write the book. I told him he had to write it if only to publish the dorsal and anal fin formulae key that he had evolved to identify fishes. He replied that it was impossible as every fish should be illustrated. “Well”, I said, “I will do it”. He laughed and said, “You took three weeks over the last drawing and there are over 1 000 fishes to be drawn.” I piped down a bit! I asked if the Trustees would pay for the illustrations and he said, “Yes, if necessary”. I replied, “There is an Art School at Rhodes”, so we decided he could write the book.

  ‘We went right through that Art School and only two out of 24 students, Valeria de la Harpe and Pat Parkin, stayed the pace. I remember Pat telling me that the Art School was very scathing about her being a “fish-artist”. J.L.B. replied that they would all be forgotten except the so-called fish-artist. Other artists included Denys Davies, a geology student, and Hester Locke, a newly married young woman from the Training College. Her contribution was far greater than the number of illustrations she did, as she helped me, especially at Lourenco Marques, to run the house, feed the artists and look after my small son. The artists worked hard. They got 5 shillings for a drawing and 10 shillings for a painting.