SEA TROUT— TRTTFF, ITS DESCRIPTION. 1G7 



The sonthorn race of sea trout are termed truff's* or trough's in Devonsliire 

 streams, and also in others along the south coast as the Fowey in Cornwall. Mr. 

 Pike, Secretary of the Dart Fishery Board, observed that these fish however appear 

 only to be known as trufi: in Devonshire, when they are young in the spring of the 

 year, but that he had seen them in the Dart as large as 12 lb. They commence 

 being taken as soon as the fishing begins on March 1st, and keep on until the end 

 of May, after which very few are killed. Also in March the white-fish is captured, 

 which he considered the young of the truff. A female 8'2 inches long from the 

 Dart, received from Col. Tiekell in Ajjril, 1886, had the form of the head as shown 

 in fig. 40, it had 1 10 rows of scales along the body, 14 in an oblique lino from the 

 adipose dorsal downwards and forwards to the lateral-line, 39 cajcal appendages : 

 a douljle row of teeth in a zig-zag line along the body of the vomer and the caudal 

 fin somewhat forked {see fig. 37, no. 2). Colours — silvery, darkest along the back, 

 with somewhat large round or x-shaped spots of a black or purplish colour on the 

 upper half of the body, and a few below the lateral-line, descending lowest anteriorly. 

 Along the lateral-line seven spots, some of which were more or less red. Upper 

 surface of the head spotted with black, and four spots on the opercle and two on 

 the preopei'cle. The dorsal fin with numerous black spots and a few i-ed ones, as 

 well as a narrow white front edge. Adipose dorsal fin yellow, with the upper 

 half orange ; pectoral gray, lightest along its lower rays ; ventral with the first 

 few outer rays stained gray ; anal yellowish-gi-ay, its front edge white, behind 

 which it had a gray tinge : caudal, pinkish-yellow. (iS'ee Fidel, March 4th, 1886.) 



* Yarrdl observed that the sahnon-trout Salma truita " is the Truff of Devonshu-e, and White 

 Trout of Wales and Ireland : it is found in the Severn, in the rivers of Cornwall, and plentifully 

 in the Esk, the Eden, the Annan and Nith, rivers falling into the Solway, where it is called sea 

 trout, and in its grilse stage Hirling " (vol. i, page 251). 



" Old Log," Field, November 2'Jth, 1880, remarked that Salmo trutta, or the sea'trout, familiarly 

 known under its local name of the truff, thrives well and breeds abundantly in the Devon and Cornish 

 rivers. He is a glorious fish for sport, and no matter what his size may be, as soon as ever he is 

 hooked he springs out of the water, and fights pluckily, contesting every inch of water before he 

 can be brought to the landing net. The young fish, one or two years old, from C oz. to f lb., are 

 most abundant in March, when perhaps they are dropping iovm stream to the sea ; but from April 

 onwards they are caught with salmon in the nets on their way upwards from the estuaries, and 

 throughout the summer they may be taken with a fly in the rivers up to 2 lb. or 3 lb. weight ; and 

 especially on a summer evening they may be seen rising freely and affording some exciting sport 

 after sunset, together with the peal, with which fish they are often, rightly or wrongly, associated. 

 I have frequently seen them taken in the nets up to 3 lb., or even over that weight ; but the netsmen 

 never confuse them with the salmon grilse, and will also distinguish them from the peal, though 

 the size of a small grilse may be less than that of one of the largest of the truff, and the sizes of peal 

 and truff are not widely divided. 



While salmon, some still unspawned, were netted on March 1st. Tlie tniff, however, of which 

 two or three dozen were taken during the first week, in the weir in the Dart, which divides the tidal 

 estuary from the fresh water, were all in splendid condition, and of good size, Now, this would 

 seem to indicate that the truff must spawn earlier, or mend in condition and get out to sea after 

 their spawning is over much more speedily than the salmon, and thus anticipate the general run 

 of salmon in returning to the river ; or it may be the more reasonable inference that these fish 

 do not make their first migration until they have sojourned for at least one, and generally for two 

 years in the river, and then are ready to return at the end of the winter. There is no doubt, at 

 any rate, that these white-fish, as they are called, or young truff, are particularly abundant in the 

 early sjiring, when they are probably moving down stream on their way to the sea. Later in the 

 season the nets in the weir pool, and the ladder in the weir, still continue to record the fashionable 

 arrivals and departures of the river. They mark the exodus of the last of the kelts, the uncertain 

 return of the grilse, and the regular arrival of ihc i^eal with the first floods in June. During the 

 summer the salmon come up in gradually increasing numbers, and mingling with them are the full- 

 grown truff running to upwards of 3 lb. in size ; while here and there an early fish begins to drop 

 down on his return journey, and is easily distinguished by his dull and river-stained coat among 

 the others just fresh from the sea, with their scales still glittering like burnished silver. 



The question of the peal, as a distinct species of the extensive family of Salmonidiu, must be 

 approached with more caution and considerable diffidence. I am very strongly impressed with 

 the opinion that they are a distinct fish for the following reasons, which appear to me almost 

 conclusive. In the first place, the peal appears to be different in its shape from the truff or sea 

 trout, being deeper and shorter in the body, so that a peal of 2 lb., which is about the largest size 

 attained by only a few exceptional veterans, would be quite two inches shorter than a truff of the 

 same weight, which is by no means an unusually large specimen of the latter species. The peal, in 

 fact, partakes very much of the character and shape of the sewin ; and in Welsh rivers, notably in 

 the Dovey, sewin and sea trout may be caught side by side, and the two breeds are easily distin- 



