The stakes that were subsequently removed went through an extensive preservation process in Parks Canada’s conservation laboratory in Ottawa where they remain today until a local repository capable of storing them is designated. Occasionally, some stakes are loaned for display. The ones found under the bridge are not among the oldest on the site, being in the range of 350 up to about 75 years old. The stake alignments of greatest age, up to 4,900 years old, are still in the water in another part of the channel, preserved in layers of protective silt. Thus far, no other wooden fish weirs have been found so well preserved in Canada.

RECORDS OF MNJIKANING AS A SPECIAL PLACE

     Our first written record of the fish weirs in use occurred almost 400 years ago on the first day of September 1615, when the French explorer, Samuel de Champlain left Huronia with a “Wendat” or Huron war party to journey southward to attack the Iroquois. While resting at the Atherley Narrows, Champlain observed and described the series of fish fences in the water and the method of fishing which the Hurons employed there.

“…we set out from the village [Cahiagué] on the first day of September and passed along the shore of a small lake [Lake Couchiching], distant from the said village three leagues, where they make great catches of fish which they preserve for the winter. There is another lake immediately adjoining [Lake Simcoe], which is twenty-six leagues in circumference, draining into the small one by a strait [The Narrows], where the great catch of fish takes place by means of a number of weirs which almost close the strait, leaving only small openings where they set their nets in which the fish are caught…” (Biggar 1922:56-57)

In the original French text this reads:

“...par le moyen de quantité de pallissades, qui ferme presque le destroit, y laissant seulement de petites ouvertures, où ils mettent leurs fillets, où le poisson se prend...” (Biggar 1922: 56-57)