The Black Bass 



Weight 



be depleted where the poacher Is much in 

 evidence. 



The large-mouth bass grows to a maxi- f^f^.^J^ 

 mum weight of six to eight pounds in 

 Northern waters, where it hibernates, but 

 in Florida and the Gulf States, where it is 

 active all the year, it grows much larger, 

 in Florida to twenty pounds in rare cases. 

 The small-mouth bass has a maximum 

 weight of five or six pounds, though several 

 have been recorded of fully ten pounds, 

 from a lake near Glens Falls, N. Y. As 

 usual with most other game fishes, the 

 largest bass, as a rule, are taken with bait. 

 For instance, the heaviest I ever took in 

 Florida on the artificial fly weighed four- 

 teen pounds, and with bait, twenty pounds. 

 In Northern waters the heaviest catch with 

 the fly, of small-mouth bass, seldom exceeds 

 three pounds — usually from one to tw^o 

 pounds, and for large-mouth bass a pound 

 or two more, while with bait larger fish of 

 both species may be taken. 



Owing to the variable conditions men- 

 tioned the season for black-bass fishing 



19 



