Museum ship Aalschokker "Heini"

The eel barge "Heini" is a ship specially designed for catching eels. It was built in Holland in 1932 and came to the Upper Rhine in the 1950s. The so-called Schokker fishery is originally a specific phenomenon of Dutch-Belgian inland fishing in larger rivers. The high catch figures also prompted the fishermen on the Upper Rhine to introduce this fishing technique in our region. in 1938, 22 eel boats were in operation between Mannheim and Kehl. However, after just under 50 years, the Schokker fishery had to be abandoned. The environmental disaster on the Rhine caused by the Sandoz company in 1986 and the lifting of the ban on night navigation were the main reasons for this.

The eel barge "Heini" is the last remaining functional ship of its kind on the Upper Rhine and documents an important chapter in the history of fishing on the Upper Rhine. The iron-built vessel, which is around 15 meters long and 5.40 meters wide, was owned by Rosa and Alfred Hauns in Wintersdorf from 1956 to 1991. For a ship of this size, it has an unusually large cabin area below deck with a kitchen, living room and two berths. The whole family lived here during the fishing season.

The ship has no propulsion of its own and had to be towed into the Rhine at the start of the fishing season. There it was moored on the bank and brought into the middle of the river by the current and anchored. The Schokker fishery had to follow the migration patterns of the eels and lasted from September to December. The two-week fishing phase began two to three days after the full moon. After dark, the net was placed on a large fishing tree in the current. The mature eels, which were on their way to the Sargasso Sea 5,000 kilometers away to spawn and eventually die, were caught in the net until around 4 a.m.