Discover the Venetian lagoon and its nature!

The lagoon surrounding the city of Venice dates back to more than six thousand years ago. It extends for fifty kilometres in length and eleven in width.

Sixty-seven per cent of the lagoon is covered with water, twenty-five per cent is occupied by sandbanks and eight per cent by islands.

Sandbanks have different shapes and are submerged by ordinary and exceptional high tides depending on their level. A rich vegetation including flowers such as ‘salicornia’ , which turns violet in autumn, typical of the salt marshes not attacked by erosion and which predominates in clayey soils strongly soaked in brackish water.

The fishing valleys occupy 15% of the total area of ​​the lagoon. They are pools of water artificially dammed by man who governs the flow of water.

In the valleys, eels, mullets, sea bass, sea bream are bred, all species that can tolerate wide variations in salinity.

There is a rich fauna that lives in the lagoon, there are also many birds but also goats. According to recent research, the diet on Torcello included meat and fish, but also fruit and vegetables. (cucumbers, peaches and grapes).. Goats and sheep were kept alive for a long time, in order to exploit their milk and their woollen fleece for weaving.

In Venice fresh water was a common and precious good!

Venice is surrounded by a lot of water that is brackish. From the very beginning, Venetians understood that water was a common good for everyone. For this reason its protection has always been of great importance.

In order to provide the city with fresh water local people had to look elsewhere for ideas as they had no drinking water at their disposal.

Venice and its marshes

They took the Benedictine monks as a model., who built cisterns around the courtyards in their cloisters. In open squares, courtyards and in private palaces Venetians constructed cisterns to collect their drinking water.

Public cistern

There were at least six thousand ones in the city and many of them were in use until the end of the 19th century.

Cisterns were opened at the sound of bells by the chief of the district.

The guilds of arts and crafts such as the wool workers, who needed a lot of water for their activity, had to bring in fresh water using barges.

Private cistern used like a vase for plants

During shortages water was also brought in with barges and cisterns were filled or the ‘bigolanti’ , who were women, went round the city and sold water in the various districts. They put a ‘bigolo’, a kind of curved wood, around their neck, with two buckets at the ends, and they sold it by the bucket.

A richly decorated cistern, once inside a private palace

Venetians protected their fresh water being aware that it was a common good and that high water and animals polluted their wells. Animals had to be kept away to maintain hygiene and the wells were raised or constructed on a higher level to avoid high water. The cost of cleaning the well was so high that very often it was abandoned rather than cleaned.

Cistern on a higher level

Venice inaugurated its aqueduct at the end of the nineteenth century and its cisterns were closed little by little. Today they are just ornaments!

Fishing in the lagoon of Venice: nets and equipments

When you take an excursion to the lagoon islands of Venice, you will seesome particular fishing nets. Find out how they are still used today.

Square cogoli

From March to April Venetian fishermen catch the’moeche’, small crabs, that lose their carapace at this time of the year and become very soft. Special nets called ‘cogoli’ in circular or square shape are used for this purpose and are provided with a trap at the bottom.

Nassa

The so -called ‘nassa’ consists of a metal or plastic mesh with a ‘funnel’ at the end. The bait is placed inside, and it consists of bread, cheese and bay leaf, but above all sardines because give off a strong smell. After twenty-four hours the bait is replaced and the catch is withdrawn. Those nets can be used all year round, even during the biological shutdown period and are considered eco-sustainable for the kind of fish caught, that is usually small.

For cuttlefish, nets are lowered in groups of twenty tied together, for other kinds of fish there are larger nets, and therefore they are single ones. If you catch sea cicadas they are semi-ellipsoidal in shape and fifty to one hundred are lowered at a time. The cicadas are then brought alive to the fish market.

Scales for fishing, the so-called bilancioni

Near Torcello island there is a big scale formed with a quadrangularshaped network, used for fishing. When the fish is captured it isconveyed by the movements of the net towards its centre. It is thenrecovered either with a landing net or using a boat that retrieves it frombeneath. It is used mainly to catch sardines.

Siever

Fishermen have this equipment on board, a mechanical tool or device consisting of one or more surfaces with holes of different sizes, used to separate fine materials from other coarser ones.

A tour to the islands and a stop for a bite at one of the local restaurants would be a treat!