WILD TROUT SPAWN; METHODS OF COLLECTION 

 AND UTILITY. 



By J. W. TITCOMB. 



The method of securing an ample supply of wild brook trout 

 spawn is so easy in localities where the parent fisli abound, and 

 so little has been said about this feature of trout culture, that 1 

 make bold to give my experience in this work. 



Perhaps I should apologize for describing in an article before 

 this Society a method of fishing of ancient origin which, has for 

 many years been applied by fish culturists to the capture of trout, 

 fontinalis and anadromous fishes, but I have never seen this 

 method written up in detail as modified for the capture of trout, 

 and it seems a necessary part of a chapter on trout culture under 

 the title on which I have written. I have reference to the first 

 method I shall describe for the capture of the parent fish. 



It is well known to all fish culturists that trout vary in their 

 habits of spawning, or, rather, in their selection of spawning 

 grounds. While brook trout in brooks almost invariably ascend 

 to some point beyond their natural abode, or into some spring 

 brook tributary to the main stream, it is not always the case that 

 brook trout in lakes and ponds seek the tributary streams for 

 their spawning grounds. It has been my experience that brook 

 trout living in ponds quite as frequently spawn in them as in 

 some tributary stream, even if the latter apparently afifords good 

 spawning groimds. In Vermont, the earliest run of trout begin 

 to spawn about the middle of September, although they have be- 

 gun to seek suitable spawning beds at least a month earlier. It 

 is therefore necessary for the fish culturist to guard against the 

 ascent of the fish long before he is ready to trap them if he is 

 looking for stream spawners. This is accomplished by the use 

 of a weir stretched across the stream where the trap is to be 

 located, as early as the middle of August. As this weir can be 

 used as the upper side of the proposed trap later in the season, 

 it is desirable to construct it with that object in view. 



Location. — The location of a trap should be made at a 

 point where it is least likely to be inundated or washed out by 

 freshets, which would allow the escape of many fish when they 

 are most likely to be running in greatest numbers. A point on 

 the stream near its mouth is advised, or at some place below any 



