Posted by Laurence Monkhouse on August 22, 2005 at 10:59:14 from 82.7.160.28 user Laurence_.
In Reply to: Re: Swallow anew? - but which one? posted by Jock on August 22, 2005 at 09:28:50:
Another thought - would a working Morecambe Bay boat have been as small as 13/14 foot with a standing lug sail?
The East Anglian punts (tough working boats, not the sort you pole along at Cambridge and that other place) were bigger than this. Professional fishermen anyway preferred the dipping lug sail - no I withdraw that - John Leather's 'Spritsails and Lugsails' says that 'the standing lug was not often used as a principal sail of British working boats but is still set by fishermen of Morecambe Bay...' But the boats he speaks of were 20 feet long. East Anglian punts were >18 feet long.
I suspect that a <14 foot work boat would just have been rowed.