PONDS. 29 



Ainsworth's Spawning Race. 



This race may be built like the races made for the artificial 

 impregnation ot spawn used by nearly all trout-breeders to en- 

 tice the trout up from the pond to spawn. It can be made of 

 any length, from ten to fifty feet, and from two to six feet wide, 

 according to the number of trout which are to use it and the 

 amount of water for the supply of the pond. It should be made 

 with plank sides and bottom, so tight as to keep out all sedi- 

 ment. Paving the bottom nicely with small stones will answer. 

 The bottom, whether of plank or stone, must then be covered 

 with a half-inch layer of fine, well-washed gravel. 



When one has large trout to spawn in the race, the water 

 should be two inches deep at the upper or supply end, and fif- 

 teen inches deep at the lower end, where it empties into the 

 pond, with a gentle current throughout its whole length. This 

 will give good spawning depth to the water for trout of all sizes 

 from six to twenty-four inches long. Usually a race three feet 

 wide, and from fifteen to twenty feet long, will be quite sufficient 

 for a pond of one thousand or eighteen hundred trout. 



The bottom of this race must be covered with fine wire-cloth 

 screens, of about ten meshes to the inch, made of zinc or galvan- 

 ized wire, so as not to corrode the spawn. Iron wire, if painted, 

 will answer where zinc cannot be obtained. These wire screens 

 must be nailed to wooden frames made of inch-square stuff, the 

 frames to correspond in length with the width of the race, and to 

 be as w^ide as the cloth will permit, — say two feet. Strips of 

 I -inch stuff must be nailed to the bottom of the race for the 

 screens to rest on, in such a manner that they will be raised a 

 quarter of an inch above the gravel on the bottom. This is done 

 to give good circulation to the water under the spawn as they 

 fall on to these wire screens. These screens must be laid the 

 whole length of the race, side by side, to catch the spawn as it is 

 deposited by the parent trout. 



Now, place over these another set of screens made of coarse 

 wire-cloth, of about two or three meshes to the inch, so that the 

 spawn will drop through easily. These screens must be nailed 



