FLY FISHING IN THE SEA 163 



One great difficulty is to hold the boat in such a place as I 

 have described. When you get to know the spot you will very 

 likely find that during certain tides the bass feed like this for a 

 half-hour or more, and more or less at fixed times. The sea 

 gulls know it far better than you do, and while apparently 

 asleep on their cliff perches, are patiently waiting the advent 

 of the bass. 



It may not be barring fry the bass are feeding on. Their 

 quarry may be sand-eels ; in which case an artificial sand-eel 

 of the kind described on p. 157 as being good for sea trout 

 should be tried. I have often intended to make up a combina- 

 tion whitebait fly ; a union of the real and the artificial. It 

 could be done, I think, thus : Whip on to the shank of hook 

 three or four bristles with points projecting. There may be a 

 little peacock harl with a double strip of white swan's quill 

 feather in the place of a wing. Cut a thin strip of gurnard 

 skin and twist it round the shank of the hook. Tightly fasten 

 down each end with waxed silk ; of course, any tough, bright 

 fish-skin will do. For bristles, by the way, it is not necessary 

 to go to a hog, a hair-brush will suffice. I have often rigged 

 up rather novel spinning baits in some such way as this, 

 twisting strips of fish-skin over an arrangement of hooks, 

 and have caught bass with them too. 



The flies which Mr. J. C. Wilcocks recommends for these 

 fish are any of the smaller salmon flies, and in particular the 

 Shaldon Shiner, which was used with great success by the late 

 Mr. J. C. Hale, near the village of Shaldon, on the west side 

 of the estuary of the Teign. It is a kind of imitation dragon 

 fly ; the body very thin, of flattened silver wire ; a small brush 

 of scarlet feather for the tail ; a little green, blue, and red 

 dubbing out of an old Turkey carpet for the shoulders ; and 

 bright blue wings, to which are added half a dozen fibres of 

 goose feather. It should be made about the size of a medium- 



