BY RIVER AND POND 



from the " redd." It will be some three months before 

 the alevins hatch tasty tit-bits for eels. 



THE miller's cat, if not a serious rival to otter and seal, 

 is often a skilled angler, and will dart on a 

 Four- trout lying in shallow water. One has been 



footed known to swim to an island in midstream, 

 Anglers keeping an eye open for fish on the way. 

 Moles, so essentially of the earth, and 

 earthy, are fast swimmers. The river-side rat leads a 

 semi-aquatic life, is a good diver, and will take duck- 

 lings that are afloat. And the vegetarian water vole may 

 do a little fishing at times. In Norfolk Broads stoats 

 have been seen to dart on fish in shallow water. Weasels 

 that hunt mice in marshes are as ready to swim after 

 water voles as to climb trees on bird-nesting forays. 

 The cat's love of fish has been held to suggest ancestral 

 angling habits. 



A LIVELY pond-dweller is the water-boatman so 

 called, though its first name seems super- 

 The fluous; and children are always amused to 



Boatman find that its flattish, yellowish-brown body, 

 half-an-inch long, floats upside down, with 

 its back-ridge as keel, and is rowed by long, hairy hind- 

 legs, flattened like paddles. This accomplished hunter 

 can dive, but the body is so buoyant that it floats at 

 once to the surface. At will, the boatman can turn 

 aeronaut, unfurling the antennae which are packed away 

 when in water. And it is a fiddler of sorts, making 

 music by striking the forelegs together. It is kept dry 

 in the pond by a coating of fine down, which holds the 

 air, so that when under water it shines like silver. 



15 



