218 BULLETIN OF THE UNITED STATES FISH COMMISSION. 



115 NOTEI^ OIV THE OREAT rAKE FISHERIES, DEPI.ETIOIV OF 



BliACK BA$^!!i, ETC. 



By Dr. E. STERLING. 



[From a letter to Prof. S. F. Baird.] 



As you seem to be collecting for the National Museum everything 

 that pertains to fish and fishing, I send a landing-net, fish-spear, gaff- 

 hook, and fish-line dryer, all of home make. The landing net is not such 

 as is made by the manipulator of the salmon or trout rod, but such as 

 did good service among the Lake Erie Islands some fifteen or more years 

 ago, when black bass averaged from 3 to 5i pounds each, and blue pike 

 {Lucioperca) by the thousands from 5 to 20 pounds each. With a school 

 of the former ranging from one to many hundreds there was no time lor 

 playing with the split bamboo. It was "bait, j^auk, and hist in" 500 

 pounds of this fish in part of a day's fishing; and this was lively work 

 and glorious fun. The many friends at home who partook of the harvest 

 of the lake will agree with him and cry, " Eepeat, old fisher-friend; the 

 pot and frying-pans are again empty." 



The pound nets have little to do with the depletion of the black bass 

 among the smaller islands of this group, as in many cases they are not 

 set within several miles of them. This depletion is caused entirely by 

 hook and line fishing. I have never known a black bass to be taken in 

 a gill net. This fish, a few years so numerous and of full weight, is now 

 fast disappearing, and when found in the market runs from one-half a 

 pound to 2h pounds each. To be suie, there are a few out-of the-way 

 jdaces where they hold, to a certain extent, their own in size and num- 

 ber, but this will continue only for a short time in the future. 



The blue pike used to go in such immense schools as to destroy the 

 bass fishing while on the grounds. They are a lazy fish on the hook 

 compared with the former and afford little sport to the angler. They 

 drive the bass away by their numbers and voracity, so that if he is not 

 fishing for the market and wishes to continue his bass-fishing, he must 

 change his locality. However, there is some excitement in pulling in 

 two or three 10 or 15-pound pike, especially if you wish to see great ex- 

 pause of glass eyes, extended gills, shark-like teeth, and a maw large 

 enough to take in the fish himself, but it soon becomes more than work — 

 monotonous. 



The landing net was of my invention. The maker of it, often furnish- 

 ing several for his customers, proposed to have it patented, to which I 

 agreed, but unfortunately for us, on application to the Patent-Office, 

 some one had been there for the same purpose ten years before us. The 

 nets were identical, only mine had the best arrangement for attaching 

 it to the handle. 



