SPORT ANCIENT AND MODERN 



This, which resembles a narrow lake, is re- 

 puted to contain very heavy trout. It requires 

 a strong breeze to fish it properly, though it must 

 be admitted that this is a requisite rarely lacking 

 in Upper Teesdale. After leaving the Weel, 

 the Tees re-assumes the character of a mountain 

 torrent, and within a distance of a few miles 

 forms the cataracts of Cauldron Snout and High 

 Force, the latter being the highest point to 

 which salmon can ascend the river. Below the 

 High Force the Tees cannot truthfully be styled 

 an angler's paradise, though the salmon-fishing 

 lias improved very much lately, and shows signs 

 of still further amelioration. The trouting in 

 the Tees is not very good, or perhaps it would 

 be more correct to say that the trout of the river 

 are of poor quality, usually small in size, ill-fed, 

 and white-fleshed, though game as all fish of 

 mountain-fed streams invariably are. 



The poverty of the Tees trout has been 

 usually attributed to the 'hush' from the lead- 

 mines in Upper Teesdale,' though as the latter are 

 fast becoming exhausted, this complaint will 

 remedy itself. But the hard, rocky bed of the 

 river is probably equally at fault, as being de- 

 ficient in fish food. The best trouting tributaries 

 of the Tees are on the Yorkshire side of the 

 river ; but mention must be made of the charm- 

 ing little Langley Beck, which trips through 

 Langleydale and Raby Park to 'join the statelier 

 Tees ' above Gainford, and holds good store of 

 well-fed fish. 



Near Darlington the angling is preserved by a 

 local angling association, which does good service 

 in protecting the fish, and introducing fresh 

 trout. The salmon fisheries of the Tees have 

 of late years been much improved, as is shown 

 by the greater, and increasing, quantities of fish 

 which ascend the river, not only at a much 

 earlier date than formerly, but at every possible 

 opportunity during the year. This is un- 

 doubtedly due to the demolition of Dinsdale 

 Dam, a wall of solid masonry which formerly 

 stood nearly seven feet above the summer level 

 of the pool below, and extended in a curve right 

 across the river for nearly seventy yards. The 

 question of its removal had long been mooted, 

 but 'vested interests' proved insuperable until 

 1893, when the Tees Fishery Board, recognizing 

 the necessity for its demolition, applied for and 

 obtained a provisional order authorizing them to 

 do so, an exhaustive inquiry having previously 

 been held at Darlington by Mr. C. E. Fryer, 

 the Chief Inspector of Fisheries. On his report 

 to the Board of Trade the Provisional Order was 



' I remember once fishing the Tees at Snow Hall 

 on a Monday, when the river was comparatively 

 pure, owing to no lead-washing taking place on the 

 preceding Saturday and Sunday. I killed a nice dish 

 of trout in the morning, but about mid-day, when 

 the first hush began to arrive from the upper reaches, 

 the fish stopped rising at once. 



obtained, and a Bill at once introduced to con- 

 firm it, but this was naturally opposed by the 

 owners of the dam. Negotiations were then 

 entered into between these gentlemen and the 

 late Mr. James Lowther of Wilton Castle, the 

 then chairman of the board, with the result that 

 the former finally accepted a sum of ^^3, 500 in 

 full compensation of all claims, and the dam was 

 demolished from buttress to buttress. The 

 results achieved by this have been entirely satis- 

 factory. Salmon, which formerly could only 

 pass the dam in times of heavy flood, now have 

 an uninterrupted run from the tide-way to the 

 spawning-beds, and the spring and summer runs 

 of fish have increased to a remarkable degree. 

 Still, the Tees is mainly an autumn river, 

 at which season great numbers of migratory 

 salmonidae ascend it, and it is scarcely exaggera- 

 tion to say that in a wet year some of its tribu- 

 taries are almost paved with spawning fish, of 

 which, however, a large proportion is bull-trout. 

 As a general rule the Tees salmon do not run 

 heavy. The record fish — killed on the fly — is 

 believed to be one of 32 lb. taken in 1905 near 

 Darlington, and the best bag in a single day since 

 the demolition of Dinsdale Dam is one of nine 

 fish, weighing 57 lb., taken on Lord Barnard's 

 water on 12 September, 1903, by Mr. George 

 Trotter, of Staindrop. 



Below Dinsdale the Tees is perhaps more of a 

 salmon than a trout stream, and coarse fish are 

 found in considerable abundance as far as the 

 tidal water. 



The Wear, which is the chief river whose 

 whole course is entirely in Durham, rises in 

 Hillhope Law, within a few miles of the sources 

 of the Tees and Tyne. The trout of its upper 

 waters are small and not very plentiful until it 

 reaches Stanhope. From this point the Wear 

 was designed by nature for a first-class trout- 

 stream ; it has deep, shady pools, and swift, 

 gravelly streams, and flows through a fertile 

 country that should provide an ample supply 

 of fish food, and from contemporary accounts 

 appears formerly to have been an excellent river 

 for angling. But now this is all changed, and 

 this beautiful river has become the common 

 sewer of the district it drains. None the less, 

 from Bishop Auckland, where the worst pollu- 

 tion begins, down to Chester le Street, where it 

 loses its character of a trout-stream, it still con- 

 tains a fair number of lusty fish, while in a wet 

 autumn bull-trout ascend it in great numbers. 

 Even an occasional small salmon or grilse is 

 netted in the lower reaches. Yet pollution is 

 not the only factor that has tended to the depre- 

 ciation of the angling capabilities of the Wear. 

 If the fishing rights were carefully preserved, 

 and some restriction placed on the number of 

 anglers and the methods they employ, the river 

 might recover itself to some extent ; but from 

 source to mouth the riparian owners, almost 



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