ANGLING FOR DACE AND ROACH. 107 



ANGLING FOR DACE AND ROACH. 



The dace ' is a gregarious fish, which haunts the 

 deeper waters near the piles of bridges, shady pools, 

 and beneath the masses of collected foam caused by 

 eddies. In the warmer months of the year they also 

 congregate in the shallows. They rise at a variety of 

 flies, and are likewise angled for with red worms, brands 

 lings, and the like. Above Richmond, as soon as the 

 weeds begin to rot, a grasshopper used as an artificial 

 fly is found very successful in hot weather among the 

 shallows. This mode can only be practised in a boat, with 

 a heavy stone to serve as an anchor, fastened to about a 

 yard of rope. The boat drifts gently down the stream, 

 and the stone is dropped whenever the angler considers 

 himself in the neighbourhood of a likely place. Stand- 

 ing in the stern, he first tlu-ows directly down the 

 stream, and then to the right and left ; and after try- 

 ing for about a quarter of an hour in one spot he again 

 weighs anchor, and proceeds to another station. 



Dace may also be taken with flesh flies, or small 

 house flies, which may be kept in a phial stopped with 

 a cork. With these, especially about seven or eight 

 o'clock in a summer's evening, repair to a mill stream, 

 and having fixed three or four hooks, with single 

 hair links, not above four inches long to your line, bait 

 them with the flies, and angle upon the surface of the 

 water, on the smoothest part, at the end of the stream ; 

 the dace will rise freely, especially if the sun does not 



(1) In Latin, Leitcisctts vulgaris. 



