258 HIGHLAND SPORT 



I can understand the feeling that might tempt a fish to rise 

 at a fly, or rush at a spinning bait, or a prawn working about 

 close to its mouth, I cannot imagine how such a feeling could 

 be brought into play by a lump of lob worms rolling down the 

 stream. 



I well remember the first time I ever used a worm I lost the 

 fish by striking too soon. On the next occasion it received so 

 much time that on landing it I had to cut the fish open, while 

 my hook was right in the stomach, with but a very small frag- 

 ment of the bunch of worms remaining ; thus then and there I 

 came to the conclusion that if this was not feeding, it was at 

 any rate a very good imitation of it. 



As to nothing ever being found in their stomachs, it is 

 easily accounted for by their power of ejecting the contents on 

 the first suspicion of danger. I cannot but think that if a 

 pool full of salmon were to be dynamited by a charge power- 

 ful enough to kill all the fish instantaneously, then many 

 salmon-stomachs would be found to hold food. At sea they 

 have frequently been captured with herring fry in them, and 

 have also been seen to eject the fry into the nets ; also they 

 have been caught by bits of herring on deep-sea lines, while 

 in a Norway river several were landed full of caterpillars, so 

 taking one thing with another, the balance of probabilities 

 points to the conclusion they do feed in fresh water. There 

 are many people who doubt whether every salmon escaping the 

 nets in the spring really does stay in fresh water for nearly 

 twelve months, and certainly there is a good deal in the theory 

 that after passing a period in the river they try to drop back 

 again to the sea, returning to spawn later on. It is a remark- 

 able thing in a well-stocked river to watch how each flood 

 brings fresh fish into a pool, while each succeeding one takes 

 them away to replace them by others. Those that vanish are 

 supposed to pass up stream, but if they all did, then by the 

 time October came the upper waters would be literally crawling 

 with fish, but that does not happen, and it is likely enough 



