Both Champlain’s map and drawings of Wampanoag houses at Plymouth harbor suggest that the summer coastal settlements were laid out with each family’s house (or in some cases, probably each wife’s house) being located amid or beside its field.[317] Average field size was probably about one acre.[318] Drawings made by Champlain show fields fenced with parallel poles placed upright in the manner of a low stockade.[319] It was in these summer villages that the Wampanoags spent the most time during the year.[320] Actually, a family might make one or two moves during the summer, although staying in the same general area. When the fields planted later in the season were too far away for convenience, the family would move into another house near the field they were currently cultivating. Another resident of southern coastal New England, the flea, sometimes prompted a shift in residence during the summer. Fleas lived in the dust in the houses, and when they became unbearable an Indian family would move to a fresh dwelling.[321] Reports of visitors to the southern New England coast prior to the plague give the impression that settlements of the “summer village” type were strung out all along the coast.[322] Settlements apparently were variable in size.[323] Writers who made this observation may have been looking both at actual variation in total group size and at seasonal variation in population concentration and dispersal. The most concentrated settlements were the winter villages.[324] A longhouse in one of the winter villages might shelter 40 or 50 people; there is no indication as to the number of longhouses that might have been found in such a village.[323] Fall hunting encampments were, like the summer settlements, dispersed. Men moved onto the lands to which they had the hunting rights. Since more land was needed for hunting than farming, the spread of dwellings would have been much thinner. As for the spring fishing camps, it is known only that large numbers of people gathered at them; sources give no hint of settlement pattern. ENERGY AND POWER The principal source of light and heat for the Wampanoags was the same fire over which they cooked their meals. Additional light was sometimes provided by torches. One variety was made of birch bark and was used in night fishing.[324] Pine splints also served as torches, used for lighting the interiors of houses.[325] Both percussion and friction methods of fire-making were used. For kindling fire by percussion the Indian carried with him a small pouch containing the proper materials for striking a light—a piece of spongy dry wood for tinder and stones for producing the spark. One stone was fastened onto the tinder stick to more surely catch the spark when it fell.[326] Aside from fire for heat, light, and cooking, and occasional use of the sail, no naturally occurring sources of energy and power were controlled by the Wampanoags. COMMUNICATION