140 LOCHLEVEN PIKE. [CHAP. iv. 



It has been compared with the Fario Lemanus of the Lake of 

 Geneva, and having handled both fishes I must allow that there 

 is very little difference between them; but still there are differ- 

 ences. Boats can be hired at Kinross for an hour or two's 

 fishing on Lochleven. Mr. Barnet, the editor of the local paper, 

 himself a keen fisher, will, I have no doubt, put gentlemen in 

 the way of enjoying a day's pike or trout fishing on the loch. 



I need not go over all the varieties of fresh-water trout 

 seriatim, for their name is legion, and every book on angling 

 contains lists of those that are peculiar to the districts treated 

 upon. If anglers' fishes ever become valuable as food, it will 

 be by the cultivation of our great lochs. With such a vast 

 expanse of water as is contained in some of these lakes, and 

 having ample river accommodation at hand for spawning 

 purposes, there could be no doubt that artificial breeding, if 

 properly gone about, would be successful. The Lochleven 

 trout in particular might be made a subject of piscicultural 

 experiment \ it is already of great money value commercially, 

 and could be cultivated so as to become a considerable source 

 of revenue to the proprietor of the lake and amusement to the 

 angler. 



There are some pretty big pike in Lochleven ; I lately 

 examined a very large one, weighing sixteen pounds, that had 

 been feeding very industriously on the dainty trout of the 

 loch. As every angler knows, the pike affords capital sport, 

 and may be taken in many different ways. Pike spawn in 

 March and April, when the fish leaves its hiding-place in the 

 deep water and retires for procreative purposes into shallow 

 creeks or ditches. The pike yields a very large quantity of 

 roe on the average, and the young fish are not long in being 

 hatched. Endowed with great feeding power, pike grow 

 rapidly from the first, attaining a length of twenty-two inches. 

 Before that period a young pike is called a jack, arid its in- 

 crease of weight is at the rate of about four pounds a year 



