The Danish fisheries c.1450-1800. Medieval and early modern ...

We do not as yet have a complete picture of the development of the West Jutland
fisheries in the later seventeenth and eighteenth centuries for lack of investigation of the estate
records after 1660. Trade figures do, however, provide a clear indication of developments (see
Figure 4). The export of Ribe declined from one million flatfish in 1600 to 300,000 pieces in
1700, and was halved in the next 30 years. The trade of the other main outlets of Hjerting and
Ringkøbing was just as bad, and although the figures are less than complete due to the
destruction of of many customs records, there is no doubt that the West Jutland fish exports
had almost completely ceased by the end of the eighteenth century.
The Limfjord
The ecosystem of the Limfjord is known to have been exposed to recurrent dramatic changes
through the last millennium with several changes from highly saline to brackish water.
Archeofaunal investigations have documented that the fiord fishery of the Iron and Viking
ages was dominated by plaice and eel at a time when the fiord must have been highly saline as
the fiord was open both to the north and west for North Sea water of 3.5% salinity. 3 Rising
land level closed the entries to the fiord sometime in the eleventh century, preempting the
inflow of salt water from the North Sea. By 1200 the fiord was reported to have a rich herring
fishery, and the herring seems to have adapted to alternating brackish and saline water
conditions, as the fiord was its main feeding area through the spring before it migrated into
the 3% saline conditions of the Kattegat for spawning. In 1624 the fiord was opened to the
west by a storm. The herring stock seems to have suffered from the influx of North Sea water
as the fisheries were reported to be much depressed by the early 1630s. In the next few years
the breach of the sand dunes closed and the stock recovered. A well-documented repetition of
the scenario occurred in 1825 when a breach of the coastline caused the herring to be first
3 Inge Bødker Enghoff,