Ethnology of Manihiki and Rakahanga
Bailers
Bailers
Coconut shells are used for bailers (tata) for the small canoes, but wooden bailers are made for the larger canoes on the Polynesian principle of a scoop with a mesial handle projecting forward from the upper edge of the raised back. The scoop figured in plate 7, D has a flat bottom with fairly vertical sides meeting the wide bottom at an approximately right angle. This departure from the rounded bottom has probably been influenced by the use of the modern flat-bottomed canoes, large ones necessitating the use of such flat bailers for loading and unloading trading schooners.