Smelt (fish)
Smelting is the process of removing pure metal from its ore by heating the oxidized ore in the presence of a reducing agent such as carbon (coke) and a fluxing agent to remove the accompanying rock gangue. The smelting of haematite is shown on the iron page.
A small fish in the Great Lakes that runs in large schools along the coastline during its migration to its spawning streams. The fish usually reach only 6 inches and are a food source for salmon and lake trout. It is one of the few fish that sportsman are allow to net, using gill nets, either along the coastline or in the streams. Some sportsman also icefish for smelt. Smelt are often eaten whole and fried.
The Boy's Own Book of Outdoor Sports (early 1900s) adds:
In the United States this fish seldom exceeds ten inches in length, and the usual size is from five to eight inches. In South America they grow to the length of two feet, are semi-transparent, and are most delicious eating. Some of them caught by American sailors at the Straits of Magellan were thirty inches long by eight inches round the body. The smelt is exceedingly plentiful in the waters around Boston, and they are also taken in the rivers of New jersey and the ponds of Long Island. They are of a pale green color on the back, with silvery sides, and a satin band running along the sides. They may be called a sea fish, though they run up fresh water streams in the spring to spawn. They are caught in October and November, and in the winter months by breaking holes in the ice. The tackle used for the smelt is a silk, or silk and hair line, with Limerick trout hooks Nos. 2 to 5, on single gut leaders. The sinker should be pretty heavy to overcome the tide. Shrimp bait is generally used, or small pieces of minnow or frog will answer. If you wish to fish them through a hole in the ice, take a piece of small brass wire a foot and a half long, put it through a piece of lead for a sinker, and fasten your hooks at both ends. Tie on a cotton or flax line and then drop your hooks. You can use three or four of these lines at different holes, setting them, while you are either skating or running round to keep warm. In this way you will get a fine string of smelts in a short time. Smelts will live, breed and thrive when transferred to fresh water ponds; and by some people these fresh water smelt are considered the best eating. They live a long time out of water and hence are good eating after being carried long distances.