SALMON 253 



April, and it may be accepted for certain that two kelts were 

 landed for every " right " one, while my own personal ex- 

 perience has been in the proportion of at least three to one ; 

 therefore in the period I have named, some four thousand kelts 

 were brought to bank on Dee-side, and if even only one 

 thousand of these were killed in the gaffing, it would be far 

 too large a yearly tribute to cold steel. Personally, I don't 

 think it is every other fish that survives being gaffed, for I 

 remember, some ten years ago, fishing the Crathes water on 

 the Dee in the spring, and the anglers on some of the waters 

 above me made a practice of gaffing every kelt they landed, 

 which filled the pools I was fishing with dead and dying ones, 

 the most of which I took out, to satisfy myself they had suc- 

 cumbed to gafif wounds. My fish-book of that season, 1884, 

 states I took out nearly three hundred kelts with but thirty-five 

 clean fish in three months, which gives an average of seven or 

 eight foul fish for each fresh-run one ; but this was an excep- 

 tionally heavy take of kelts. 



There are but few anglers who would grumble if a fine 

 were imposed on gaffing a kelt. This would be a better plan 

 than forbidding the carrying of a gaff until after a certain date, 

 which is now done on a few rivers. The salmon landing-net 

 is so large that its porterage entails the necessity of an attendant 

 to carry it ; while as there are numbers of anglers who delight 

 in going out alone to do for themselves, as well as many more 

 who cannot afford the luxury of a gillie, I would simply make 

 it a finable offence to put cold steel into a kelt, and then leave 

 each angler to his own devices. 



I am credibly informed that kelt sells at sixpence a pound 

 in Aberdeen, so any fine imposed should be sufficiently heavy 

 to forbid the making of a profit on the capture of a kelt. How 

 people can be found to purchase kelt passes my comprehension, 

 for, out of curiosity, 1 once had the middle slice from a large, 

 well-" mended" one boiled, but anything more horrid, tasteless, 

 blankety, and nauseating I cannot imagine. 



