156 Thirtieth Annual Meeting 



dryer than 1899 and fishermen were apprehensive of results this 

 year. To our surprise and pleasure, the fishing has been better this 

 season than for years past, especially as to size of fish. A larger 

 number of trout weighing from one-half to one pound has come un- 

 der my notice than for years — while a large number running from 

 six to nine inches have been caught. In fact any one with a knowl- 

 edge of fishing can get a few of fair size nearly any day. In speak- 

 ing of a well known and much fished brook, one of our oldest ang- 

 lers said: "I have known and fished that brook for twenty years 

 and never knew the fishing to be better than it is today." Now one 

 swallow doesn't make a summer — but my personal opinion is that 

 this extra fishing after unfavorable conditions is largely, if not en- 

 tirely, due to the planting of well grown hardy fish instead of the 

 fry usually distributed. To be sure fry were planted as well, and I 

 firmly believe fry planting to be of value, but if we could have from 

 25 to 33 per cent, of the total of fry in well fed trout from two to 

 four and one-half inches long, 1 firmly believe the results would be 

 more substantial in every way. 



Yours truly, 

 (Signed). W. H. BEASOM. 



Possibly some of you may not agree with Mr. Beasom in his 

 conclusions, may not think them sufficiently warranted from the 

 evidence. It is true tliis is largely circumstantial. I admit 

 that brook trout yearlings weighing one-half pound and upwards 

 sound somewhat like fish stories. Yet with his long experience 

 as an angler, his thorough knowledge of the conditions coupled 

 with his general reputation as a conservative man, his opinion is 

 certainly worthy of careful consideration. 



This is a matter on which it is exceedingly hard to obtain 

 positive proof; the difficulty of successfully marking fry when 

 liberated, the impossibility of determining the age of wild fish 

 wlien caught, but add to our perplexity. Still there are condi- 

 tions under which even these peri)lexing questions admit of a 

 definite solution. Such an occasion is detailed in the accompany- 

 ing letter from Mr. ^'^athaniel Wentworth, president of the New 

 Hampshire Fish and Game Commission, a director of this so- 

 ciety and a man equally well known across the border as in his 

 own Xew England as an expert with rod and gun. 



Hudson Center, N. H., July 1st, 1901. 

 Dear Mr. Thompson:— Yours of June 28th, at hand. The pond I 

 stocked last fall with fingerlings was made by building a dam across 

 a ravine. There had never been a trout or fish of any kind in the 



