250 SALMONID^ OF BRITAIN. 



tell at a glance a i-iver from a sea trout. lu the early summer or late spring tliey 

 appear on the coast of Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, and the province of Quebec, 

 running up the St. Lawrence in countless myriad. Into every 'gully' and mouths 

 of every river or good-sized brook they crowd, so that I have known of a man 

 standing on the sand beach of the gully at Pokemouche, with a red hackle, 

 taking them just as fast as he could land them and re-cast. They run quite 

 even in size, from 1 lb, up to 3 lb., or more, but averaging about 1| lb. to 2 lb. 

 They are bright and silvery, showing some red spots, but rarely any blue, 

 and their flesh is deep red and very fine-flavoured. The motive for this 

 ajDpearance of the schools seems to be to follow up the caplin that run up 

 the rivers at this season to spawn. In some of the Canadian rivers these 

 sea trout are found more or less through the summer ; but, although I have been 

 on or near several of the rivers, I have never been able to satisfy myself that there 

 was an autumn run of sea trout, that is at spawning time, to be compared at all, 

 in point of number or regularity of time of occurrence, with the spring run. In 

 fact, I doubt whether they do spawn in fresh water ; and yet, if they do not, it 

 would be a most remarkable exception to what we know of the habits of the Salmo 

 family. We have here in Massachusetts a sea trout that is well known on the 

 south side of Cape Cod, and called by the natives ' salters,' that also ran up the 

 mouths of the brooks in early spring, in this case coming up after the shrimps. 

 Although evidently of the same family as the i*egular brook trout that are caught 

 in the same waters, they difl'er from them even more than the Canadian sea trout 

 do from their river confreres. The main difference between the latter lies in 

 colour, whereas our salters not only are as silvery as a salmon, but their shape is 

 very different — they have very small heads, are roach backed, very deep, and 

 weigh nearly twice as much as a brook trout of the same length. That they are 

 mox^e palatable to the gourmet is proved by the fact tliat they easily command a 

 dollar a pound in the market, where the others will sell from 37^ to 50 cents. 

 Their flesh is very red, and the firm flakes are separated by a layer of fatty curd., 

 such as we find in a fresh-run salmon with the sea lice still on him." 



Habits. — Similar to our char and, like it, appears to prefer deep water, ponds 

 under eight feet in depth being unsuited. Is generally considei-ed to have great 

 roving propensities, and is not often found rising to the fly after having attained 

 a pound in weight. It is somewhat a greedy feeder, and when artificially fed will 

 often eat to repletion. A '^Conservator'' writing from Shropshire to The Field, 

 remarked that he considered it useless for turning into a running water, as it 

 drops down stream, while it does not attain to the size of our brook-trout, and in 

 a lake will not rise well to the fly. He thought it as bad as pike in destroying- 

 other fish, consequently he did not recommend it, although it is excellent eating, 

 and fights well when hooked. 



It had been observed at Howietoun that these fish, as well as the trout, were 

 much more shy* on Sundays than on any other day of the week, and this was 

 ascertained to be simply owing to the attendants on that day being differently 



* Mr. Seth Green, superintendent of the New York State Fish Hatchery, says that in the 

 fish-pond at the hatchery there are 5000 large brook trout that were all captured with the fly in 

 unfrequented streams and lakes of the Adirondack region. These trout, he says, have convinced 

 him that fish have reasoning powers and memory. When they were hooked and reeled slowly to 

 the boats, they had time and opportunity to note the form and character of the tackle that made 

 them prisoners. They have never forgotten that. They will follow Mr. Green as he walks about 

 the pond. Let him have a walking-stick and a fishing-rod hidden behind his back, if he reveals 

 the former to the fish, by holding it over the water, they pay no attention to it. But the moment 

 he produces his rod with the tackle, away they all scamper to distant parts of the pond. Mr. 

 Green says he will permit any one to cast a fly in that pond to his heart's content, as he is satis- 

 fied that not one of the trout will come near it, so vividly do they remember their enemy of five 

 years ago. At a recent meeting at New York, Mr. Green stated that he was trying to see if 

 brook trout can be improved by mixing different kinds, since it is known that constant inter- 

 breeding of animals deteriorates them in size and intellect. Mr. Green rather amused the 

 meeting by maintaining that fish had reasoning powers, and that he did not see why they could 

 not be improved in point of intellect. "If," said he, "we can breed a trout that has sense 

 enough to avoid the nets of the poachers on Long Island, I am under the impression that some 

 clubs that I know of would be willing to give somebody a chrome." 



