How to obtain it. 65 



outlet screen goes without saying. It should be the duty of some 

 one to attend to it as often as may be required. The amount of 

 attention needful varies very much indeed in different cases. I 

 have screens working which are not touched oftener than once in 

 three or four weeks, and I have others that require attention every 

 day and sometimes twice daily. There are exceptional times, that 

 come perhaps once a year, when a screen requires special attention 

 for a few days, as, for instance, during a slight rise in the water in 

 autumn when the leaves are falling. As I have already pointed 

 out, a good deal depends upon the position of a screen, and much 

 also upon the way in which it is guarded. I have seen one that 

 was almost hopelessly unworkable work quite easily after steps 

 had been taken for preventing the floating matter from coming on 

 to it, and this can often be done in a very simple manner. A few 

 bundles of sticks or of thorns placed in the water so as to form a 

 semicircle just above the screen have done excellent service many 

 a time. A wooden hack placed two or three feet in front of it 

 will answer the same purpose. I have seen wire netting used, but 

 it has the objection of being bad to clean. From a wooden hack, 

 or an iron one either, rubbish can easily be raked, but not so 

 easily from wire netting. Should it be the most convenient device 

 at hand, it should be stretched upon movable frames that can be 

 lifted bodily and well shaken, or the netting beaten with sticks or 

 switches to clear it of the mass of material that is at times sure to 

 collect upon it. Bundles of thorns, hedge clippings in fact, 

 do very well, and if plenty of them are used they are most 

 efficacious. 



The working of a screen may also be materially helped by 

 planting a bed of reeds (Arundo phragmitis) or of bullrushes 

 (Typha laiifolia) in front of it. These will do excellent service 

 in keeping it clear, by preventing the bulk of the floating matter 

 from reaching it at all, and by working a few bundles of sticks at 

 the back of a reed bed a screen may be made to give very little 

 trouble indeed. "Where there is a will there is a way," but the 

 disgraceful manner in which many of the outlet screens I have 

 seen have been worked would lead one to suppose that it was a 

 very difficult way. On newly-made fish ponds, however, it should I 

 not be so. 

 F 



