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Show July Is Sponge Fishing Season; Big Tropical Industry Revived 1 ' i r I 1 -T- - I IV MD-JLLY beg,ns the annual sponge fv take betuecn coasts oj -v - Miami, Fla., and Nas- r '.-Kw '"i;"!!" sail, of the Bahama is- ( " -A , x lands group, from uhith M. JO1 jt comes most of the iK-V rV sponges ined in U. o. y- homes. The above liew N , Jious the sponge fleet I - " at anchor off the British , ' ' colonial quay at Aasoou. , . ' Sponges are taken from i dinghys which put out x'""S from the sloops uhen a I 4"' f bed is sighted. Fisher- b " " -IJ " ,J men carry glass-bot- V, , tomed buckets and I g J s Z1 spears. Others (right) P' Uj'i ' ' ' pick by hand. h I K s ' - Uh&7$ ! h , f H: J i)pongcs grow at almost any depth of water. Above photo shows natives picking them ! ' i from a shallow pool. Left: A ' fisherman depositing part of the 'L day's catch in a rocked-in coral pool on a small island where the sponges will remain soak- , "H, i- trar? until the fleet returns to , 5,"' Nsssau. The British colonial 9" p f 5 government is experimenting in J ' $ " ' ' plant,n8 f sponge beds. There 1 i: J' ' are ''lrpp varieties: Silk sponge, ' T I " ' wool and common type, most f4"f generally used in North Amer- t ! '"a. When the fleet sets out v 1 it' f - from Nass-au it us-ually remains ftsjf ' on ay for two weeks to a month. r , ' . ' . I? ' t$XSgi f J W hen fishermen have secured a catch they return to Nassau vhere sponges are dried out and placed on sale at an auction umilar to a southern tobacco auction in the United States. Actual drying process is shown above. Sponges are buried under tveeds and straw to dry out in the sun. Since the unique sponge can be classed neither with the "meta-zoo" "meta-zoo" or the "protozoa" many zoologists place it in a special sub-kingdom sub-kingdom known as porife.ra. Sponges may range in size from a pins head to masses several feet high, and vary in weight from a qrain to more than 100 pounds. |