Fisheries

One word on this list does not sound like standard German, and it is not. Der Steert is the cod end, the closed bag at the back of a trawl where the whole catch ends up. It is Low German for a tail, the northern form of the word that standard German keeps as der Sterz, a bird’s tail or the handle at the back of a plough. Dutch has the same word as staart, tail, and English has kept it in one bird only: the redstart is the bird with the red tail. So a trawl, seen from the deck, is an animal with a mouth held open by die Scherbretter and a tail that is untied when the catch comes aboard. The rest of the list is written in a different register altogether, the one of ministries and inspectors: die Anlandepflicht, die zulässige Gesamtfangmenge, das Mindestmaß.