The Haunts of the Black Sea-Rass 



T is said that when the purchase 

 of the northwest coast was con- 

 templated by the United States 

 Government, an old English 

 raconteur and fly-fisherman re- 

 marked, " Oh, let the Yankees have it ; 

 the salmon won't rise to a fly ! " 



Southern California might go by default 

 in this way, as fly-fishing, compared with 

 that of the East, is not to be had, though 

 the San Gabriel, Arroyo Seco, and other 

 canons have many pools where gleams of 

 light and color flash, telling of the liv- 

 ing rainbow lurking in the shadows. If 

 Southern California is deficient in black- 

 bass streams and salmon pools, it possesses 

 the finest marine fishing in North Ameri- 

 can waters ; not only in the size and gamy 

 qualities of the fish, but in the variety of 

 forms which follow each other as the sea- 

 sons advance, adding new and constant zest 

 to the sport. 



The striped-bass fishing has its proto- 

 type here in the gamy yellow-tail, seriola 

 dorsalis, which attains a weight of forty or 

 fifty pounds, and is as rapid in its move- 

 ments as the tarpon. An important per- 

 sonage is he who lands a yellow-tail on 

 an ordinary striped-bass rod, reel, and line. 

 Equally gamy as the yellow-tail is the sea- 



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