Bearded Skipper calling it quits

By Jim Brown

FOR THE SOU’WESTER

Transcontinental Media

NORTH RUSTICO, P.E.I. – A man who is the face of deep-sea fishing on P.E.I. is packing his gear after 42 years.

Norman Peters, 67, wanted to retire from his deep-sea fishing business a few years ago, but his clients wouldn’t let him.

“Tourists would come up and say you can’t get out of it. We’re bringing our grandkids down.”

Peters admits he will miss them, too.

“I’d love to give them all a hug,” he said.

You simply can’t put a price on the thousands of smiles he’s seen on the faces of youngsters and their proud parents when they hold up their catches for cameras. But the Rustico fisherman finally sold his business to another local resident, Carl Gallant, who will continue to run it under the famous Bearded Skipper name.

“He fishes out of here,” said Peters.

Aside from some gear — including lifejackets and fishing rods — there’s not much to pass on, other than his business phone number and a long list of customers and friends.

What about his captain’s cap?

“Oh no,” laughed Peters in mock horror, “I’ll always be the Bearded Skipper.”

Much has changed over the past four decades. Peters recalls working in charter boats years ago when fishing gear consisted of twine rolled around beer cans. It also wasn’t unheard of for intoxicated members of fishing parties to dive overboard for a swim.

“Nowadays drinking is very controlled,” said the skipper.

Of course, fish were much easier to catch then.

“You could get them with safety pins. They were on top of the water for miles — lovely, big mackerel. They’d bite on the bare hooks.”

Now, even the gulls and gannets are “starving” and will chase after hooked fish, ensnaring themselves in gear. Peters has seen hundreds of gannets swoop close whenever fish are hauled in, diving into the water to grab them.

There just aren’t as many fish and guts tossed overboard these days to feed the seabirds, he added.

“If you can’t get it in fast enough, they’ve got the hook,” said Peters.

Now that he’s no longer operating the fishing tours he plans to spend more time at the Rustico Harbour Fisheries Museum, which he founded.

“I might put in a couple of days a week building traps outside for tourists.”

Peters wife, Marie, says she’s relieved her husband has retired from a grueling job, though he will still continue to fish lobster during the spring season. But when he had both the deep-sea fishing business and fished lobster, his work often ran from sunrise to sundown, six days a week.

“If you got a windstorm, he’d get a day off,” joked Marie.

(Jim Brown is a journalist with Transcontinental Media’s Journal Pioneer, which is a contributor to the Sou’Wester.)