Aug 27, 2007, 360 import, The Reaper

This is 'The Reaper', a fife sailing herring drifter which not a million years ago sailed the North Sea in pursuit of plentiful fish stocks. This weekend she was moored up in Arbroath as a visitor attraction during Seafest weekend. Once Arbroath harbour, along with many other small fishing towns and villages along this stretch of coastline, was full of boats just like her. They braved the cruel North Sea and brought back holds full of white fish. Sometimes I look across the harbour at the many shiny new leisure craft moored on the new purpose built pontoons and picture the harbour 100 years ago full of these brown sailed fishing vessels brimming with their white fish catch. What a sight that would have been. Today no white fish are landed at Arbroath harbour, today the only catch to be landed here is crabs and lobsters. There are still some small fishing boats registered to Arbroath but nothing like as many as there were 100 years ago. The Reaper represents the most popular design of fishing vessel used through out the 19th and early 20th century. She was built in Sandhaven near Fraserbrough in 1902, almost one of the last of her kind. She is also one of the biggest of her kind. She is a 70 foot, two masted lugger, usually berthed at Anstruther and oft found at exhibitions and tourist attractions through out the UK. She has had a bit of a chequered career; used first as a fishing vessel registered in a variety of places in Scotland, she was then requisitioned by the Admiralty during the war and post war she was used as a cargo vessel in Shetland. She is now the property of the Scottish fisheries Museum in Anstruther. All in all I think she is my all time favourite of the Seafest.
I have quite a few photos of her, some are in the set of 'Seafest' photos and some are old ones in a 'Reaper' set. She is worth having a look at so please just check her out, she is amasing.