234 



THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



CORRESPONDENCE. 



FIGHT BETWEEN, A TROUT AND A WA- 

 TER-SNAKE. 



To the Editor of the Popular Science Monthly. 



HAVING read in your July number Mr. 

 Buckland's account of a fight between 

 a scorpion and a mouse, I am induced to 

 give you an account of a remarkable con- 

 flict between a large water-snake and a trout, 

 witnessed by myself and one of my brother 

 officers in tbe survey in 1867, on the Pu- 

 rissima, a small trout-stream which empties 

 into the ocean about twenty-four miles south 

 of San Francisco. We had been fishing on 

 the stream, and came to a high bank which 

 overlooked a transparent pool of water 

 about ten feet in diameter and four feet in 

 depth. This pool was fringed with willows, 

 and had on one side a small gravel-bank. 

 The trout at first sight was lying in mid- 

 water, heading up-stream. It was, as after- 

 ward ascertained, fully nine inches in length, 

 a very desirable prize for an angler. While 

 studying how to cast our flies to secure him, 

 a novel fisherman appeared, and so quick 

 were his actions that we suspended our 

 own to witness them. This new enemy of 

 the trout was a large water-snake of the 

 common variety, striped black and yellow. 

 He swam up the pool on the surface until 

 over the trout, when he made a dive, and by 

 a dexterous movement seized the trout in 

 such a fashion that the jaws of the snake 

 closed its mouth. The fight then com- 

 menced. The trout had the use of its tail 



and fins, and could drag the snake fiom the 

 surface ; when near the bottom, however, 

 the snake made use of its tail by winding 

 it around every stone or root that it could 

 reach. After securing this tail-hold it could 

 drag the trout toward the bank, but, on let- 

 ting go, the trout would have a new advan- 

 tage. This battle was continued for full 

 twenty minutes, when the snake managed to 

 get its tail out of the water and clasped 

 around the root of one of the willows men- 

 tioned as overhanging the pool. The battle 

 was then up, for the snake gradually put coil 

 after coil around the root, with each onedras- 

 ging the fish toward the land. When half 

 its body was coiled it unloosed the first hold 

 and stretched the end of its tail out in every 

 direction, and, finding another root, made 

 fast, and now using both dragged the trout 

 out on the gravel-bank. It now had it under 

 control, and, uncoiling, the snake dragged 

 the fish fully ten feet up on the bank, and 

 I suppose would have gorged him. We 

 killed the snake, and replaced the trout in 

 the water, as we thought that he deserved 

 liberty. He was apparently unhurt, and in 

 a few moments darted off. That the water- 

 snake of our California brooks will prey upon 

 the young of trout and also smaller and less 

 active fishes, I have noticed, but never have 

 seen an attack on a fish so large or one more 

 hotly contested. Yours respectfully, 

 A. W. Chase, 

 Assistant U. S. Coast Survey. 



EDITOR'S TABLE. 



THE NEW YORK AQUARIUM. 



THE devotees of rational amusement, 

 tbe lovers of natural history, and 

 the friends of scientific education, in 

 this city, are to he congratulated on the 

 establishment of the aquarium which 

 was recently completed and opened to 

 visitors. Undoubtedly the devotees of 

 rational amusement are not so nu- 



merous as they might be, hut they will 

 increase in numbers as increasing fa- 

 cilities are afforded for combining agree- 

 able recreation with instructive obser- 

 vation in the acquisition of pleasant 

 knowledge without much trouble. As 

 a means of increasing the general taste 

 in natural history, and affording stu- 

 dents the opportunity of familiarizing 



