The pagan tribes of Borneo - Get a Free Blog Here

VIII LIFE ON THE RIVERS 139
with decaying cocoanut and thrown into the river
with a long rattan attached to it and tied to a pole ;
the trap sinks to the bottom and is examined from
time to time.
Tuba Fishing
Fish are caught on the largest scale by poisoning
the water with the juice of the root of the tuba
plant. This is usually practised in the smaller rivers
at times of slack water, all the people of a village
co-operating. The tuba plant is cultivated in
patches on \h^ padi fields. Pieces of the roots are
cut off without destroying the plants. When a
large quantity has been gathered, a fence is built
across the river at the spot chosen, and big bubu
traps are let into it facing up stream. Then all the
available small boats are manned and brought into
the reaches of the river extending about a mile
above the fence. Each boat carries a supply of
tuba root, which the people bruise by pounding it
with wooden clubs against stumps and rocks on the
bank or against the side of the boat. Water is
thrown into the bottom of the boat and the pounded
root is rinsed in the water, pounded again, and
again rinsed, until all its poisonous juice is extracted.
The water in all the boats, become milky with the
juice, is poured at a given signal into the river,
either by baling or by overturning the boats.
After some twenty minutes the fish begin to rise to
the surface and rush wildly to and fro. In the
meantime the boats have been put to rights, and
now begin to pursue the fish, the men armed with
fish- spears, the women with landing-nets. The
sport goes on for several hours. Some men armed
with clubs stand upon a platform which slopes up
at a low angle out of the water and rests upon the
fence. Big fish come leaping upon this platform
and are clubbed by the men, who have to exert